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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 




William Herbert 



SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS 



EDITED, WITH NOTES 
BY 

WILLIAM J. ROLFE, Litt.D. 

FORMERLY HEAD MASTER OF THE HIGH SCHOOL, 
CAMBRIDGE, MASS. 



ILLUSTRATED 



NEW YORK-:- CINCINNATI-:- CHICAGO 

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 






OCT 31 1 90S 
townm-uun j Sl rakespeai 

HtsfSJL 

- 1 Y S. 



Copyright, 1883 and 1898, by 
HARPER & BROTHERS. 

Copyright, 1905, by 
WILLIAM J. ROLFE. 



SONNETS. 
W. P. I 



PREFACE 

This is practically a new book, the critical matter 
in my former edition of the Sonnets (published in 1883, 
and somewhat revised and enlarged in subsequent years) 
having been mostly rewritten and considerably aug- 
mented. So far as I am aware, it is the first thoroughly 
annotated edition that has appeared in this country. 
The American editors of Shakespeare's works, like the 
great majority of those in England, have given less 
attention to the poems than to the plays ; and the only 
separate English editions of the Sonnets (including both 
text and commentary) worth mentioning are those of 
Dowden, Tyler, and Wyndham (in his Poems of Shake- 
speare). Many books about the So?inets have been pub- 
lished on both sides of the Atlantic, the majority of 
which, to my thinking, are chiefly notable for their 
fanciful theories of the origin and significance of the 
poems. For a full bibliography of these books, and 
also of the German literature of the subject (down to 
1881, when it appeared), Dowden's larger edition may 
be consulted. For the critical student, as I said in my 
former edition, his careful resume answers a double 
purpose : as a bibliography, directing him to the books 
and papers on the subject, if he is moved to read any 
or all of them ; and as a compact and convenient sub- 
stitute for these books and papers, if he wants to know 
their gist and substance without the drudgery of wading 
through them. I doubt not that the majority of stu- 
dents will be thankful that Dowden has relieved them 
of the drudgery by compressing many a dull volume or 
magazine article into a page or a paragraph. 

My indebtedness to Dowden, Tyler, and Wyndham 
is duly acknowledged in the introduction and the notes. 
My own work must pass for what it may seem to be 
worth. A few questions, at least, I feel sure that I 

5 



6 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

have definitely settled : for instance, that Shakespeare 
could not have supervised or authorized the publication 
of the Sonnets ; and that the date (and consequently the 
interpretation) of Sonnet 144 has been misunderstood 
by every former editor and commentator. Whether I 
have proved that the order of the first series (1-126) is 
not strictly chronological, and that some of them were 
addressed to a woman, the reader must decide for him- 
self ; and also whether he will endorse my criticisms of 
Mr. Sidney Lee's views concerning the identity of "Mr. 
W. H." and of the " rival poet," and sundry minor 
questions. 

I have given special attention to Mr. Lee's theories 
of the Sonnets, partly because he has developed and 
defended them at such length in his Life of Shakespeare 
(quite out of proportion to the space allotted to other 
controverted questions of importance), and partly be- 
cause his book is, in most other respects, so scholarly 
and authoritative. As in all cases where I disagree 
with other authors, I have endeavoured to state Mr. 
Lee's opinions and arguments fairly — generally in his 
own words — and as fully as the space at my command 
would permit. 

In the partial revision of my former edition (1890) I 
was inclined, with many careful critics, to accept Mr. 
Tyler's ingenious and plausible identification of the 
" dark lady " with Mary Fitton ; and the more so after 
critical friends who had visited Gawsworth to examine 
the statue of Mary on the family monument, had assured 
me that the remnants of paint on the stone indicated 
that she was really a " dark lady," as Tyler had asserted. 
But her portraits (see p. 32 below) prove that she was 
a blonde rather than a brunette, and the colours on the 
statue, if originally true to nature, must have darkened 
with the lapse of centuries. 



CONTENTS 



Introduction to Shakespeare's Sonnets 

The Early Editions 

Their History and Interpretation . 

I. Was the Edition of 1600 authorized or supervised 

by Shakespeare ? 
II. Are the Sonnets Autobiographical ? 

III. To whom is the Dedication addressed, and what 

does it Mean ? 

IV. Are All the Sonnets addressed to Two Persons ? 
V. Concerning the Order of the Sonnets 

VI. Who was " Mr. W. H." ? . 
VII. The Date of the Sonnets . 
VIII. Who was the "Rival Poet"? 
IX. Other Theories of the Sonnets 
X. Conclusions .... 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 
Notes .... 



Appendix : 

The Sonnets and the Baconian Theory . 
Was Barnabe Barnes the " Rival Poet " ? 

Index of Words and Phrases Explained 

7 



PAGE 
9 

9 
II 

II 

13 
19 

22 

25 
29 

37 
43 
43 

44 

47 
141 



250 
256 

265 




Henry Wriothesley 




INTRODUCTION TO SHAKESPEARE'S 
SONNETS 



The Early Editions 

The Sonnets were first published in 1609, with the 
following title-page (as given in the fac-simile of 1870): 

SHAKE-SPEARES | Sonnets. | Neuer before Im- 
printed. I at London | By G. Eld for 7. 1. and are | 
to be solde by William Asfiley. | 1609. 



io Shakespeare's Sonnets 

In some copies the latter part of the imprint reads : 
"to be solde by John Wright, dwelling | at Christ 
Church gate. | 1609." 

At the end of the volume A Lover's Complaint was 
printed. 

In 1640 the Sonnets (except Nos. 18, 19, 43, 56, 75, 
76, 96, and 126), rearranged under various titles, with 
the pieces in The Passionate Pilgrim, A Lover's Com- 
plaint, The Phoenix and the Turtle, the lines " Why- 
should this a desert be," etc. (A. Y. L. iii. 2. 133 fol.), 
" Take, O take those lips away," etc. {M, for M. iv. 1. 
1 fol.), and sundry translations from Ovid, evidently 
not Shakespeare's, were published with the following 
title : 

POEMS : I Written | by | Wil. Shake-speare. | 
Gent. I Printed at London by Tho. Cotes, and are | to 
be sold by Lohn Benson, dwelling in | S* Dunstans 
Church-yard. 1640. 

There is an introductory address " To the Reader " 
by Benson, in which he asserts that the poems are " of 
the same purity the Authour himselfe then living 
avouched," and that they will be found " seren, cleere 
and eligantly plaine." He adds that by bringing them 
" to the perfect view of all men " he is " glad to be ser- 
viceable for the continuance of glory to the deserved 
Author." 

The order of the poems in this volume is followed in 
the editions of Gildon (17 10) and of Sewell (1725 and 
1728); also in those published by Ewing (1771) and 



Introduction n 

Evans (1775). In all these editions the sonnets men- 
tioned above (18, 19, etc.) are omitted, and 138 and 144 
are given in the form in which they appear in The 
Passionate Pilgrim. 

The first complete reprint of the Sonnets, after the 
edition of 1609, appears to have been in the collected 
edition of Shakespeare's Poems, published by Lintott 
in 1709. 

The earliest known reference to the Sonnets is in the 
Palladis Tamia of Meres, who speaks of them as " his 
sugred Sonnets among his priuate friends." This was 
in 1598, and the next year two of them (138 and 144) 
were printed in The Passionate Pilgrim. We do not 
know that any of the others were published before 
1609. 

Their History and Interpretation 

There are many questions concerning the history 
and interpretation of the Sonnets over which editors, 
commentators, and critics have wrangled, and over some 
of which they will doubtless continue to wrangle to the 
last syllable of recorded time. 

I. Was the Edition of 1609 authorized or super- 
vised by Shakespeare ? — Some editors have answered 
the question in the negative, but the reasons given for 
the decision are far from conclusive. The fact that the 
dedication is the publisher's, not the author's, has, for 
instance, been cited ; but there are those who tell us 
that the poet, for certain reasons, chose to hide behind 



12 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Master Thorpe. Dowden, who summarizes the entire 
literature of the subject in the introduction to his larger 
edition of the Sonnets, says " there is reason to believe " 
that the edition of 1609 had "neither the superintend- 
ence nor the consent of the author ; " but the only 
reason he gives for this opinion — and presumably the 
best he could offer — is that the book, "though not 
carelessly printed, is far less accurate than the Venits 
and Adonis ." That poem and the Luc7"ece are the only 
works of Shakespeare that he himself appears to have 
seen through the press. Both are carefully printed for 
that day, and the Lucrece at least, as the variations in 
copies of the first edition clearly prove, was corrected 
by the author while on the press. Both, moreover, con- 
tain formal dedications signed with his name. 

The 1609 edition of the Sonnets, on the other hand, 
abounds in errors of the type, most of which Shakespeare 
could not have failed to detect if he had supervised the 
printing. He was pretty certainly in London in 1609, 
and if he allowed these " sugred sonnets " to be printed 
at all, he would surely have seen that they were printed 
well. 

The question, however, is definitely settled (as I was 
the first to point out) by one little peculiarity in the 
printing of the 126th Sonnet, if sonnet it may be called. 
It has only twelve lines, and Thorpe (or his editor), 
assuming that a couplet had been lost, completed the 
normal fourteen lines by two blank ones enclosed in 
marks of parenthesis ; thus : — 



Introduction 13 

( ) 

( ) 

Shakespeare could not have done this, and Thorpe 
would not have done it if he had been in communication 
with Shakespeare. In that case he would have asked 
the poet for the couplet he supposed to be missing, and 
would have been told that nothing was missing. The 
piece is not an imperfect sonnet of Shakespeare's pat- 
tern, but is made up of six rhymed couplets, and the 
sense is apparently complete. 

There is another fact that may have a bearing upon 
this question. The final couplet of the 96th Sonnet is 
the same as that of the 36th. The lines do not fit the 
later poem as well as they do the earlier one. Possibly, 
as Dowden suggests, the manuscript of the 96th may 
have been imperfect, and Thorpe, or his editor, filled it 
out as well as he could with a couplet from another 
Sonnet. Of course he would not have done this if the 
book had been printed with the author's knowledge or 
consent. 

If Shakespeare had nothing to do, directly or indi- 
rectly, with the publication of the Sonnets, the fact has 
some important bearings, as we shall see further on. 

II. Are the Sonnets Autobiographical? — Are 
the Sonnets, wholly or in part, autobiographical, or are 
they merely " poetical exercises " dealing with imaginary 
persons and experiences ? This is the question to 
which all others relating to the poems are secondary 
and subordinate. 



14 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

For myself, I firmly believe that the great majority of 
the Sonnets, to quote what Wordsworth says of them, 
" express Shakespeare's own feelings in his own per- 
son ; " or, as he says in his sonnet on the sonnet, " with 
this same key Shakespeare unlocked his heart." Brown- 
ing, quoting this, asks : " Did Shakespeare ? If so, the 
less Shakespeare he ! " to which Swinburne replies, 
" No whit the less like Shakespeare, but undoubtedly 
the less like Browning." 

The theory that the Sonnets are mere exercises of 
fancy, " the free outcome of a poetic imagination," as 
Delius phrases it, is easy and specious at first, but lands 
us at last among worse perplexities than it evades. 
That Shakespeare, for example, should write seventeen 
sonnets urging a young man to marry and perpetuate 
his family is strange enough, but that he should select 
such a theme as the fictitious basis for seventeen sonnets 
is stranger yet ; and the same may be said of the story 
or stories apparently underlying other of the poems. 
Some critics, indeed, who take them to be thus artifi- 
cially inspired, have been compelled to regard them as 
" satirical " — intended to ridicule the sonneteers of the 
time, especially Drayton and Sir John Davies of Here- 
ford. Others, like Professor Minto, who believe the 
first 126 to be personal, regard the rest as " exercises of 
skill, undertaken in a spirit of wanton defiance and 
derision of commonplace." The poems, to quote Dow- 
den, " are in the taste of the time ; less extravagant and 
less full of conceits than many other Elizabethan collec- 



Introduction 



'5 



tions, more distinguished by exquisite imagination and 
all that betokens genuine feeling. . . . All that is 
quaint or contorted or ' conceited ' in them can be 
paralleled from passages of early plays of Shakespeare, 
such as Romeo and Juliet, and the Two Gentle??ien of 
Verona, where assuredly no satirical intention is dis- 
coverable." 

If the Sonnets were mostly written before 1598 when 
Meres refers to them, or 1599 when Jaggard printed 
two of them, or in 1 593 and 1 594, as Sidney Lee assumes, 
and if most of them, as the same critic believes, were 
" little more than professional trials of skill, often of 
superlative merit, to which the poet deemed himself 
challenged by the efforts of contemporary practitioners," 
it is passing strange that Shakespeare should not have 
published them ten or fifteen years before they were 
brought out by the pirate Thorpe. He must have 
written them for publication if that was their character, 
and the extraordinary popularity of his earlier poems 
would have insured them a favourable reception with 
the public. His fellow-townsman and friend, Richard 
Field, who had published the Venus and Adonis in 1593 
and the Lucrece in 1594, and who must have known of 
the circulation of the sonnets in manuscript, would have 
urged him to publish them ; or, if the author had de- 
clined to have them printed, some pirate, like Jaggard or 
Thorpe, would have done it long before 1609. Mr. Lee 
tells us that Sidney, Watson, Daniel, and Constable cir- 
culated their sonnets for a time in manuscript, but he 



1 6 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

tells us also that the pirates generally got hold of them 
and published them within a few years if the authors did 
not do it. But the history of The Passionate Pilgrim 
shows that it was not so easy to obtain copies of Shakes- 
peare's sonnets for publication. It was the success of 
Venus and Adonis and Lucrece (the fourth edition of the 
former being issued in 1599, and the second of the 
latter in 1598) which prompted Jaggard to compile 
The Passionate Pilgrim in 1599 ; and it is a significant 
fact that he was able to rake together only ten poems 
which can possibly be Shakespeare's, and three of these 
were from Love's Labour 's Lost, which had been pub- 
lished in 1598. To these ten pieces he added ten others 
(eleven, as ordinarily printed) which he impudently 
called Shakespeare's, though we know that most of them 
were stolen and can trace some of them to the authors. 
His book bears evidence in its very make-up that he 
was hard pushed to fill the pages and give the pur- 
chaser a tolerable sixpence-worth. The matter is 
printed on but one side of the leaf, and is further spun 
out by putting a head-piece and tail-piece on every 
page, so that a dozen lines of text sandwiched between 
these convenient pictorial devices make as fair a show 
as double the quantity would ordinarily present. 

Note, however, that, with all his pickings and steal- 
ings, Jaggard managed to secure but two of the sonnets, 
though a considerable number of them were probably 
in existence among the author's " private friends," as 
Meres expressed it a year before. The pirate New- 



Introduction iy 

man, in 1591, was able to print one hundred and eight 
sonnets by Sidney which had been circulated in manu- 
script, and to add to them twenty-eight by Daniel with- 
out the author's knowledge ; and sonnets by Watson 
and Constable, as Mr. Lee tells us, were similarly circu- 
lated and pirated. How, then, are we to explain the 
fact that Jaggard could obtain only two of Shakespeare's 
sonnets, five years or more after they had been circulat- 
ing among his friends ? Is it not evident that the 
poems must have been carefully guarded by these 
friends on account of their personal and private 
character ? A dozen more of those sonnets would have 
filled out Jaggard's " larcenous bundle of verse," and 
have obviated the necessity of pilfering from Barnfield, 
Griffin, Marlowe, and the rest; but at the time they 
were in such close confidential keeping that he could 
get no copies of them. In the course of years they 
were shown to a larger and larger number of " private 
friends," and with the multiplication of copies the 
chances of their getting outside of that confidential 
circle were proportionally increased. We need not be 
surprised, then, that a decade later somebody had suc- 
ceeded in obtaining copies of them all, and sold the 
collection to Thorpe. 

Even if we suppose that the Sonnets had been imper- 
sonal, and that Shakespeare for some reason that we 
cannot guess had wished to withhold them from the 
press, we may be sure that he could not have done it in 
that day of imperfect copyright restrictions. Nothing 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 2 



1 8 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

could have kept a hundred and fifty poems by so popu- 
lar an author out of print if there had not been strong 
personal reasons for maintaining their privacy. At 
least seven editions of the Venus and Adonis and four 
of the Lucrece appeared before Thorpe was able to 
secure " copy " for his edition of the Sonnets. 

If, as Mr. Lee asserts, Southampton was the patron 
to whom twenty that may be called " dedicatory " son- 
nets (23, 26, 32, 37, 38, 69, 77-86, 100, 101, 103, and 
106) are addressed, it is all the more remarkable that 
Shakespeare should not have published them, or, if he 
hesitated to do it, that his noble patron should not have 
urged it. He had already dedicated both the Venus 
and Adonis and the Lucrece to Southampton ; and Mr. 
Lee says that " three of the twenty dedicatory sonnets 
[26, 32, 38] merely translate into the language of poetry 
the expressions of devotion which had already done 
duty in the dedicatory epistle in verse that precedes 
Lucrece.'''' Other sonnet-sequences of the time (includ- 
ing the four mentioned by Mr. Lee as pirated while 
circulated in manuscript, except Sidney's, which were 
not thus published until after his death) were brought 
out by their authors, with dedications to noble lords or 
ladies. Shakespeare's Sonnets, so far as I am aware, 
are the only exception to the rule. 

Mr. Lee himself admits that "at a first glance a far 
larger proportion of Shakespeare's sonnets give the 
reader the illusion of personal confessions than those 
of any contemporary ; " and elsewhere he recognizes 



Introduction 19 

in them more " intensity" than appears in the earlier 
poems except in "occasional utterances" of Lua-ece ; 
but, for all that, he would have us believe that they are 
not personal, and that their " superior and more evenly 
sustained energy is to be attributed, not to the acces- 
sion of power that comes with increase of years, but to 
the innate principles of the poetic form, and to metrical 
exigencies which impelled the sonneteer to aim at a 
uniform condensation of thought and language." I 
cannot help agreeing with those who regard their per- 
sonal character as no " illusion," and who believe that 
they clearly show the increase of power which comes 
with years, their true date probably being 1597-98 
rather than 1593-94. 

For myself, I could as soon believe the penitential 
psalms of David to be purely rhetorical and fictitious 
as the 129th Sonnet, than which no more remorseful 
utterance was ever wrung from a soul that had tasted 
the ashes to which the Sodom-apples of illicit love are 
turned in the end. Have we there nothing but the 
" admirable fooling " of the actor masquerading in the 
garb of the penitent, or the satirist mimicking the con- 
ceits and affectations of the sonneteers of the time ? If 
this is supposed to be the counterfeit of feeling, I can 
only exclaim with Leonato in Much Ado, " O God ! 
counterfeit ! There was never counterfeit of passion 
came so near the life of passion ! " 

III. TO WHOM IS THE DEDICATION ADDRESSED, AND 

what does it mean ? — If Shakespeare had nothing to 



20 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

do with Thorpe's venture, the dedication is Thorpe's 
own, as it purports to be. But in what sense was " Mr. 
W. H.," whoever he may have been, " the onlie beget- 
ter " of the Sonnets ? " Begetter " may mean either the 
person to whom the poems owed their birth and to 
whom they were originally addressed, or the one who 
collected and arranged them for Thorpe. The majority 
of critics take the word in the former and more familiar 
sense, while the minority cite examples of the other 
meaning from writers of the time and argue plausibly 
for its adoption here. Both explanations have their 
difficulties, but the first seems on the whole the more 
probable. The choice between them does not of 
necessity affect the opinions we may form concerning 
the origin, the order, or the significance of the Sonnets. 
Who " Mr. W. H." was critics will probably never 
agree in deciding ; but if he was not the editor of the 
book of 1609, it had an editor about whom we know 
with certainty neither more nor less than we know 
about " Mr. W. H." 

The vital question concerning the unknown editor 
is whether he was in the confidence of either the writer 
of the sonnets or the person or persons to or for whom 
they were written. If he was not, his arrangement of 
the poems is not an authoritative one ; and that he was 
not is evident from the fact that he did not, and pre- 
sumably could not, ask either the author or the ad- 
dressee of the 126th Sonnet for that supposed lost 
couplet. Neither author nor addressee having been 



Introduction 21 

privy to the publication of the poems, neither would 
have assisted the piratical editor or publisher in 
arranging them for the press. 

Dr. Furnivall, in a private note, says he has no 
doubt that the insertion of the marks of parenthesis 
" was the printer's doings ; " and Mr. Thomas Tyler, 
in his edition of the Somiets (London, 1890), expresses 
the same opinion ; but it is extremely improbable that 
the printer would resort to this extraordinary typo- 
graphical expedient (absolutely unprecedented, so far 
as my observation goes) without consulting the pub- 
lisher, and Thorpe would not have consented to it if 
he could have avoided it. It is clear that printer or 
publisher, or both, considered that something was evi- 
dently wanting which could not be supplied and must 
be accounted for. 

Dr. Furnivall also says that the supposed " editor " 
is "an imaginary being." He is in nowise essential 
to the theory. If anybody chooses to regard Thorpe 
as his own editor, be it so. Whether he arranged the 
poems as we find them in his edition or somebody else 
arranged them for him does not matter. In either 
case, he simply did the work as well as he could from 
what he knew of the history of the poems or could 
learn from a study of them. 

The editor, as we will call him, though not in the con- 
fidence of the persons directly concerned, had evidently 
become deeply interested in the poems, and spent 
much time and labour in making a collection of them. 



22 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

In the course of the ten years or more previous to 1609, 
he had gathered in the 154, which he sorted and ar- 
ranged for publication. Those urging a friend to marry 
were easily picked out ; and this group of seventeen, 
as the largest — or, perhaps, as that in which the con- 
nection would be most obvious to the average reader — 
he placed first. As to the arrangement of the other 
groups he had made, he doubtless had his own theory, 
based, we may suppose, on facts better known or more 
accessible then than now ; but he had not all the infor- 
mation he needed for doing the work with absolute 
accuracy. After arranging the first 126, or all that he 
regarded as addressed to "Mr. W. H." or the poet's 
male friend, he appended those written to the " dark 
lady," as he supposed — apparently without any at- 
tempt at regular order, except in a few small groups 
readily made up — and, having added the two Cupid 
sonnets, handed the whole collection to Thorpe for 
printing. 

IV. Are all the Sonnets addressed to two Per- 
sons ? — It is hardly possible that certain of the sonnets 
in the second group (127-152) were really addressed 
to the " dark lady," — 129, for instance, though it may 
have been suggested by his relations with her, and 
146, which seems to be entirely independent of that 
entanglement. 

It is also very doubtful whether certain sonnets in 
the first group (1-126) properly belong there. Some 
of them appear to have been addressed to a woman 



Introduction 23 

rather than a man — for instance, 97, 98, 99, etc. Of 
course everybody familiar with the literature of that 
time knows, as Dyce remarks, that " it was then not 
uncommon for one man to write verses to another in 
a strain of such tender affection as fully warrants us 
in terming them amatory." Many of Shakespeare's 
sonnets which he addressed to his young friend are of 
this character, and were it not for internal evidence to 
the contrary might be supposed to be addressed to a 
woman. But Sonnets 97, 98, and 99 could hardly 
have been w r ritten to a male friend even in that day. 
Look at 99, for example : — 

"The forward violet thus did I chide: 
Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells, 
If not from my love's breath ? The purple pride 
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells 
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed. 
The lily I condemned for thy hand, 
And buds of marjoram had stolen thy hair ; 
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand, 
One blushing shame, another white despair ; 
A third, nor red nor white, had stolen of both, 
And to his robbery had annex'd thy breath ; 
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth 
A vengeful canker eat him up to death. 

More flowers I noted, yet I none could see 
But sweet or colour it had stolen from thee." 

If this sonnet were met with where we had no external 
evidence that it was addressed to a man, could we have 
a moment's hesitation in deciding that it must be 



24 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

addressed to a woman ? Even in Elizabethan times, 
when extravagant eulogies of manly beauty were so 
common, do we find the poet dwelling upon his " love's 
breath " or the " lily " whiteness of his hand ? From 
first to last, the sweetness and loveliness described in 
the verses are unmistakably feminine. 

I find a curious parallel to this sonnet in one of Con- 
stable's (9th of 1 st Decade), published in 1594 1 : — 

" My Lady's presence makes the Roses red, 
Because to see her lips they blush for shame. 
The Lily's leaves, for envy, pale became, 
And her white hands in them this envy bred. 
The Marigold the leaves abroad doth spread ; 
Because the sun's and her power is the same. 
The Violet of purple colour came, 
Dyed in the blood she made my heart to shed. 
In brief. All flowers from her their virtue take ; 
From her sweet breath, their sweet smells do proceed ; 
The living heat which her eyebeams doth make 
Warmeth the ground, and quickeneth the seed. 
The rain, wherewith she watereth the flowers, 
Falls from mine eyes, which she dissolves in showers." 

Reference to the lily hands and sweet breath of women 
are frequent in the Elizabethan sonnets, but I have 
noted nothing of the kind in the sonnets addressed to 
men. 

There are several other of Shakespeare's sonnets in 

1 Whether it was one of the smaller number of Sonnets printed in 
1592 I do not know. From its position in the first ten in the Diana of 
1594 I should infer that it was ; but there can be little doubt that it was 
earlier than Shakespeare's. 



Introduction 



25 



this group (1-126) which may or may not be addressed 
to women ; the internal evidence does not settle the 
question beyond a doubt. Our editor, if he thought of 
the question (which is unlikely, as it does not appear to 
have occurred to him in connection with the 99th), 
gave them the benefit of the doubt and included them 
in this group. 

V. Concerning the Order of the Sonnets. — 
Moreover, certain sonnets in the first group appear to 
be out of place, though many of the editors attempt to 
prove that the order of the series is Shakespeare's own. 
But if the 70th Sonnet is addressed to the same person 
as 33-35 (to say nothing of 40-42) it seems to be clearly 
out of place. Here the poet says : — 

" That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect, 
For slander's mark zuas ever yet the fair ; 
The ornament of beauty is suspect, 
A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air. 
So thou be good, slander doth but approve 
Thy worth the greater, being woo'd of time ; 
For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love, 
And thou present'st a pure unstained prime. 
Thou hast pass'd by the ambush of young days, 
Either not assaiVd or victor being charged ; 
Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise 
To tie up envy evermore enlarg'd." 

His friend has been charged with yielding to the 
seductions of vice, but the accusations are declared to 
be false and slanderous. He is said to present " a pure 
unstained prime," having passed through the tempta- 



i6 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

tions of youth either " not assailed " by them or "victor 
being charged ; " but in 33-35 we learn that he has 
been assailed and has not come off victorious. There 
the "stain" and " disgrace " of his " sensual fault " are 
clearly set forth, though they are excused and forgiven. 
Here the young man is the victim of slander, but has 
in no wise deserved it. If he is the same young man 
who is so plainly, though sadly and tenderly, reproved 
in 33-35, this sonnet must have been written before 
those. One broken link spoils the chain ; if the order 
of the poems is wrong here, it may be so elsewhere. 

Mr. Tyler's attempt to show that this sonnet is not 
out of place is a good illustration of the " tricks of 
desperation" to which a critic may be driven in defence 
of his theory : " Slander ever fastens on the purest 
characters. His friend's prime was unstained, such an 
affair as that with poet's mistress not being regarded, 
apparently, as involving serious moral blemish. More- 
over, there had been forgiveness ; and the special refer- 
ence here may be to some charge of which Mr. W. H. 
was innocent." Whatever this charge may be, the 
" pure unstained prime " covers the period referred to 
in Sonnets 33-35 and 40-42 ; and the young man's 
conduct then appeared a "trespass" and a "sin," a 
" shame " and a " disgrace," to the friend who now, 
according to Mr. Tyler, sees no " serious moral blem- 
ish " in it. Let the reader compare the poems for 
himself, and draw his own conclusions. Mr. Tyler has 
the grace to add to what is quoted above : " But (as in 



Introduction 27 

79) Shakespeare can scarcely escape the charge oi 
adulation." Rather than believe William Shakespeare 
guilty of " adulation " so ineffably base and sycophantic, 
I could suppose, as some do, that Bacon wrote the 
Sonnets. 

Both Furnivall and Dowden, in their exposition of 
the relation of each sonnet to the story involved in the 
series, fail to explain this 70th Sonnet satisfactorily. 
FurnivalPs comment, in his analysis of Sonnets 67-70, 
is this : " Will has mixed with bad company, but 
Shakespeare is sure he is pure, and excuses him." At 
this stage of the friendship, then, Shakespeare is 
" sure " that the young man is " pure ; " but in the 
analysis of Sonnets 33-35, we read: "Will's sensual 
fault blamed, repented, and forgiven ; " and this 
" fault," as the context explains, is taking away Shakes- 
peare's mistress. There can be no doubt as to the 
fact and the nature of the sin mourned and condemned 
in the earlier sonnets ; nor can there be any question 
that the later sonnet congratulates the youth to whom 
it is addressed, not on having repented after yielding 
to temptation, but on having either escaped or resisted 
all such temptations. If this youth and the other youth 
are one and the same, the sonnets cannot be in chro- 
nological order. 

Dowden, in like manner, infers from the earlier 
sonnets that "Will" has been " false to friendship," 
and that the only excuse that Shakespeare can offer for 
him is that "he is but a boy whom a woman has be- 



28 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

guiled ; " but in the 70th Sonnet the poet says that the 
charges of loose living brought against his friend 
"must be slanders." Dowden cannot mean that this 
sonnet is a friendly attempt to apologize for Will's dis- 
grace after the poet has forgiven him. We have that 
in Sonnets 35, 36, 40, 41, and 42, where Elizabethan 
conceits are racked to the uttermost to excuse both his 
friend and his mistress for playing him false ; but, in 
70 his friend is "pure," though he cannot escape 
slander, " unstained," though envy would fain besmirch 
him. 

Mr. Gollancz, in the " Temple " edition of the 
Sonnets, after quoting what I say in my former edition 
(as here) to prove that 70 is out of place, simply repeats 
Tyler's attempt to prove the contrary. " Surely," he 
says, " the faults referred to in the earlier sonnets are 
not only forgiven, but here [in 70] imputed to slander." 
This is an evasion of my argument. That the sin was 
forgiven is obvious ; but the latter sonnet says that the 
sin was never committed, and it therefore needed no 
forgiveness. How lightly such lapses were regarded 
in the olden time we all know ; but in this case the 
treason to friendship was added, and the earlier sonnets 
show that Shakespeare did not regard the double sin 
as "involving no serious moral blemish." 

The critics who believe the Sonnets to be autobio- 
graphical generally agree in assuming that all of them 
(or all but two) are either addressed to one man and 
one woman, or connected with the poet's relations with 



Introduction 



29 



those two persons. Is it not probable, on the face of 
it, that a poet who " unlocked his heart " to such an 
extent in this form of verse would occasionally, if not 
often, have employed it in expressing his feelings 
towards other friends or with reference to other expe- 
riences ? Is it likely that the two Cupid sonnets 
(153, 154) and the Venus and Adonis sonnets in The 
Passionate Pilgrim (if we believe those to be Shakes- 
peare's — which is extremely improbable) and the 
sonnets in Love's Labour V Lost are his only efforts in 
this kind of composition outside of this great series ? 
Is it not far more probable that some sonnets in this 
series really have no connection with the persons and 
events supposed to be directly connected with the 
series ? 

VI. Who was "Mr. W. H."? — If we assume that 
the Sonnets are autobiographical, and that all, or nearly 
all, are addressed to two persons — a young man be- 
loved of the poet, and the " dark lady," with whom 
they were both entangled — can these persons be iden- 
tified ? The majority of the critics who accept the 
personal theory assume that the "Mr. W. H." of the 
dedication was this young man, rather than the col- 
lector or editor of the poems. 

The only theories concerning the young man (whether 
" Mr. W. H." or not) that are worthy of serious con- 
sideration are that he was William Herbert, Earl of 
Pembroke, or that he was Henry Wriothesley, Earl of 
Southampton. 



30 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

As early as 1819 Mr. B. H. Bright suggested that 
Herbert was the man, and this theory has steadily 
gained favour with biographers and critics. The editor 
of the "Temple" edition, who accepts the Southamp- 
ton theory, writing a few years ago, believed that the 
Herbert theory was "in the ascendant." He added: 
" Many a former ally of Southampton has rallied round 
the banner unfurled by Herbert's redoubtable cham- 
pion, Mr. Thomas Tyler." But more recently (in 1897) 
Sidney Lee, who had been on the side of Herbert, has 
now (in his article on Shakespeare in the Dictionary of 
National Biography , and in his Life of Shakespeare) gone 
over to the Southampton party ; and Mrs. Stopes and 
one or two other recent writers have also joined that 
faction. 

William Herbert was born April 8th, 1580; and in 
the spring of 1598 he came to reside in London. He 
was brilliant, accomplished, and licentious ; " the most 
universally beloved and esteemed of any man in Lon- 
don" (Clarendon). To him and his brother Philip, 
Earl of Montgomery, as two patrons of the dramatist, 
Heminge and Condell dedicated the folio of 1623. The 
" Herbertists " assign the Sonnets to the years 1597- 
1601. The most serious objection to regarding him as 
" Mr. W. H." (or the person addressed in the Sonnets) 
was the improbability that the poet would write seven- 
teen sonnets to urge a youth of seventeen or eighteen 
to marry ; but Mr. Tyler discovered, from letters pre- 
served in the Record Office, that in 1597 the parents of 



Introduction 31 

William Herbert were engaged in negotiations for his 
marriage to Bridget Vere, daughter of the Earl of Ox- 
ford. The course of the parental match-making ran 
smooth for a while, but was soon checked by obstacles 
not clearly explained in the correspondence. Shakes- 
peare may have written the seventeen sonnets at the 
request of Herbert's mother, the Countess of Pembroke. 

It is a curious fact that Grant White, in his first 
edition of Shakespeare (1865) had said of Sonnets 
1-17 : " There seems to be no imaginable reason for 
seventeen such poetical petitions. But that a mother 
should be thus solicitous is not strange, or that she 
should long to see the beautiful children of her own 
beautiful offspring. The desire for grandchildren, and 
the love of them, seem sometimes even stronger than 
parental yearning. But I hazard this conjecture with 
little confidence." 

Mr. Tyler also attempted to prove that the " dark 
lady" was Mary Fitton, maid of honour to Queen 
Elizabeth, and mistress of Herbert, by whom she had 
a child in 1601. The Queen could not overlook the 
offence, and sent the father to the Fleet Prison. He 
was soon released, but appears never to have regained 
the royal favour. 

There is no direct evidence to connect Shakespeare 
with Mistress Fitton ; but we find that she was on 
somewhat intimate terms with a member of his theat- 
rical company, that is, the Lord Chamberlain's Com- 
pany, and was probably acquainted with other members 



32 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

of it. In 1600 William Kemp, the clown in the com- 
pany, dedicated his Nine dates wonder to " Mistris 
Anne Fitton, Mayde of Honour to most sacred Mayde, 
Royal Queene Elizabeth." As Elizabeth certainly had 
no maid of honour named Anne Fitton in 1600, while 
Mary Fitton held such office from 1595 to 1601, either 
Kemp or his printer probably made a mistake in the 
lady's Christian name in the dedication. As Mr. Tyler 
suggests, the form " Marie " might be so written as to 
be easily mistaken for " Anne." Mary had a sister 
Anne, who was married to John Newdigate on the 30th 
of April, 1587, and who could not, therefore, have been 
maid of honour in 1600. 

A statue of Mary Fitton exists as a part of the family 
monument in Gawsworth Church, Cheshire ; and the 
remnants of colour upon it were thought by Mr. Tyler 
(as by others who have seen it) to indicate that she was 
of dark complexion, with black hair and eyes, like the 
lady of the second series of the Sonnets. But Lady 
Newdigate-Newdegate {Gossip from a Muniment Room, 
1898) states that two portraits of Mary represent her 
as of fair complexion, with brown hair and gray eyes. 

It is a point in favour of the Herbert theory that 
Sonnets 135, 136, and 143 indicate that the person to 
whom the poems in the other series were addressed was 
called " Will;" but Mr. Lee considers that "Will" in 
these sonnets is only a play on Shakespeare's own name 
and the lady's " will." It is true that such quibbles on 
" Will " are found elsewhere in his works, but it is 



Introduction 33 

doubtful whether any one but a " Southamptonite " 
would see them in these sonnets. 

Henry Wriothesley was born October 6th, 1573. As 
we have seen, the Venus and Adonis and the Lucrece 
were both dedicated to him, and tradition says that he 
was a generous patron of the poet. In September, 
1595, he fell in love with Elizabeth Vernon, a cousin of 
the Earl of Essex. This lost him the favour of the 
Queen and involved him in serious troubles. In 1598 
he secretly married Elizabeth Vernon. On account of 
his connection with the rebellion of Essex he was con- 
demned to death, but the sentence was commuted to 
imprisonment for life. He was pardoned in 1603 when 
James came to the throne, and the 107th Sonnet is 
supposed by Mr. Gerald Massey to be Shakespeare's 
congratulation upon his release from prison and resto- 
ration to royal favour. The initials in " Mr. W. H.," 
according to some of the critics who identify him with 
Southampton, are those of Henry Wriothesley trans- 
posed as a " blind." 

When Southampton was seventeen (1590) he was 
urged by Burghley to marry his granddaughter, Lady 
Elizabeth Vere, a daughter of the Earl of Oxford, but 
the youth declined the alliance. If the Sonnets were 
addressed to him, the first seventeen could hardly have 
been written at this time (which is earlier than any 
date assumed for the poems), but the efforts of his 
friends to find him a wife continued for several years 
afterwards. 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 3 



34 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

While Mr. Lee believes that such of the Sonnets as 
are personal in their character are addressed to South- 
ampton, he does not understand that nobleman to be 
the "Mr. W. H." of the dedication. He says: "No 
peer of the day bore a name that could be represented 
by the initials 'Mr. W. H.' . . . The Earl of Pem- 
broke was, from his birth to the date of his succession 
to the earldom in 1601, known by the courtesy title of 
Lord Herbert, and by no other name, and he could not 
have been designated at any period of his life by the 
symbols ' Mr. W. H.'" This may be admitted, but it 
does not prove that the "Mr. W. H." of the dedication 
was not meant to refer ambiguously to him. If Thorpe 
knew the history of the Sonnets, and that both the 
author and the person to whom they were addressed 
did not wish to have them printed, he certainly would 
not venture to inscribe the book in distinct terms to the 
Earl of Pembroke ; but he might be inclined to give an 
indirect hint to those who were acquainted with the 
story underlying the poems that he also knew of the 
Earl's connection with it. He could do this with per- 
fect safety by using the initials " W. H." which, as Mr. 
Lee elsewhere remarks, were common to many names, 
and which therefore could not be proved to be meant to 
suggest " William Herbert." 

But after all it matters little whether " W. H." was 
meant for " William Herbert " or " Henry Wriothesley," 
so far as either the Herbert or the Southampton theory 
is concerned. In either case they might refer to the 



Introduction 35 

" begetter " of the poems as the collector or editor, 
though the other interpretation of " begetter " seems to 
accord better with the rest of the dedication. Mr. Lee 
thinks that Mr. W. H. is "best identified with a 
stationer's assistant, William Hall, who was profession- 
ally engaged, like Thorpe, in procuring 'copy,'" and 
who, in 1606, "won a conspicuous success in that 
direction, and conducted his operations under cover of 
the familiar initials." Thorpe "gave Hall's initials 
only because he was an intimate associate who was 
known by those initials to their common circle of 
friends." But, though Thorpe was " bombastic " in his 
dedications, and might wish to Hall " all happiness " 
and even "eternitie," it is unlikely that he would wish 
him that "eternitie promised by our ever-living poet." 
Promised to whom ? Mr. Lee refers it to the eternity 
that Shakespeare in the Sonnets " conventionally fore- 
told for his own verse ; " but this interpretation is a 
desperate attempt to force the expression into consist- 
ency with his theory. The words plainly mean " prom- 
ised in the Sonnets to the person to whom they are 
addressed." This promise is far more prominent in 
the Sonnets than that of their own immortality, which, 
indeed, is made dependent on the enduring fame of 
the youth who is their theme and inspirer. 

If it were proved beyond a doubt that " Mr. W. H." 
was William Hall, or some other person who secured 
the Sonnets for Thorpe, I should none the less believe 
that Herbert rather than Southampton was their 



^6 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

"patron " and subject. The only facts worth mention- 
ing in favour of Southampton are that the earlier poems 
were dedicated to him, and that certain personal allu- 
sions in the Sonnets can be made to refer to him if we 
suppose them to have been written some four years 
before their more probable date. But Mr. Lee himself 
admits that these allusions are equally applicable to 
Herbert. " Both," he says, " enjoyed wealth and rank, 
both were regarded by admirers as cultivated, both 
were self-indulgent in their relations with women, and 
both in early manhood were indisposed to marry, owing 
to habits of gallantry." It may be added that both 
were noted for personal beauty, though Mr. Lee thinks 
that Francis Davison's reference to the beauty of 
Herbert in a sonnet addressed to him in 1602 is 
" cautiously qualified " in the lines : — 

" [His] outward shape, though it most lovely be, 
Doth in fair robes a fairer soul attire." 

Anybody who had not a theory to defend would see 
that the eulogy of the "fairer soul " enhances instead 
of " qualifying " the compliment to the " most lovely " 
person. This is a good illustration of Mr. Lee's 
perverse twisting of quotations for the purposes of his 
argument. He even finds a reference to Southampton's 
long hair (shown in his portrait) in the 68th Sonnet, 
where Shakespeare " points to the youth's face as a 
map of what beauty was ' without all ornament, itself 
and true,' before fashion sanctioned the use of artificial 



Introduction 37 

'golden tresses'" — though this is only one out of 
several illustrations of the poet's antipathy to false 
hair. See Love's Labour 's Lost, iv. 3. 258, Merchant of 
Venice, iii. 2. 95, and Timon of Athens, iv. 3. 144. 

VII. The Date of the Sonnets. — One of the most 
serious objections to the Southampton theory is the 
necessity which it involves of fixing the date of the 
poems as early as 1592 or 1593= That period of 
Shakespeare's career is so crowded with work, dramatic 
and poetic, that it is quite impossible to add anything 
more to it. If he did not begin authorship until 1590 
(as is generally assumed, though a few critics believe it 
may have been as early as 1588 or 1589) the period of 
his literary apprenticeship covers only four (or at most 
six) years or to the end of 1594 ; and during this time 
he revised more or less thoroughly Titus Andronicus 
and the three parts , of Henry VL., and wrote at least 
seven original plays — Love's Labour 's Lost, The Two 
Gentlemen of Verona, The Comedy of Errors, A Mid- 
summer- -Nights Dream, Romeo and Juliet, Richard LLL., 
and Richard LL. The two long poems, Venus and Adonis 
and Lucrece, also belong to this period. To all this 
some critics (Mr. Lee among them) would add King 
John and The Merchant of Venice. And all this time 
Shakespeare was actively engaged in his profession as 
an actor. Is it conceivable that before the end of 1594, 
in addition to all this work, he could have produced the 
Sonnets, most of which Mr. Lee assumes to have been 
written between the spring of 1593 and the autumn of 



3 8 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

1594? Personally, I believe that King John cannot 
be dated earlier than 1595 or The Merchant of Venice 
than 1596 or 1597, and yet the literary productivity of 
the preceding period, which must include all the other 
plays and poems mentioned, seems to me prodigious. 

There are difficulties, it is true, according to some of 
the critics, in fixing the date of the Sonnets as required 
by the Herbert theory. The earliest of them cannot 
be supposed to have been written before 1597, when 
Herbert's friends desired that he should marry Bridget 
Vere ; and it has been assumed that the rest, or the great 
majority of them, must have been written before Jaggard 
printed the 144th Sonnet in 1599, because, it is said, 
that sonnet proves that the intrigue with the "dark 
lady " had come to an end. But, though no critic 
appears to have pointed it out, this is clearly a misin- 
terpretation of that sonnet, which, % instead of marking 
the end of the story, really belongs to a comparatively 
early stage of it. The sonnet, which it is well to quote 
here in order to bring it directly before the eye of the 
reader, is as follows : — 

" Two loves I have of comfort and despair, 
Which like two spirits do suggest me still ; 
The better angel is a man right fair, 
The worser spirit a woman colour'd ill. 
To win me soon to hell, my female evil 
Tempteth my better angel from my side, 
And would corrupt my saint to be a devil, 
Wooing his purity with her foul pride. 
And whether that my angel be turn'd fiend 



Introduction 39 

Suspect I may, yet not directly tell ; 

But being both from me, both to each friend, 

I guess one angel in another's hell. 

Yet this shall I ne'er know, but live in doubt, 
Till my bad angel fire my good one out." 

This certainly refers to the period indicated in 
Sonnets 33-35, at the latest. The poet says that the 
woman " tempteth " (not, has succeeded in seducing) 
his friend. She " would corrupt " him, but whether she 
has actually done it, he adds, " Suspect I may, yet not 
directly tell," and " I guess one angel in another's hell ; " 
but he does not " know " this, and will " live in doubt " 
until the affair comes to an end. But in Sonnets 34 
and 35 he had no doubt that the " woman coloured ill" 
had corrupted his "better angel." He endeavours to 
excuse the "sensual fault" of his friend; but in the 
next sonnet he decides that 

" We two must be twain, 
Although our undivided loves are one." 

They cannot wholly cease to love each other, but " a 
separable spite " ("a cruel fate that spitefully separates 
us from each other," as Malone paraphrases it) must 
put an end to their friendly intercourse. In Sonnets 
40-42 he recurs to the " robbery " his friend has com- 
mitted ; and laments, not only the loss of his mistress, 
but that of his friend : — 

" That thou hast her, it is not all my grief, 
And yet it may be said I loved her dearly; 



4-0 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

That she hath thee is of my wailing chief, 
A loss in love that touches me more nearly." 

Is it not evident that Sonnet 144, with its suspicions 
and doubts and guesses, was written before rather 
than after 33-35 and 40-42, where the same facts are 
treated as facts well established, and thoroughly recog- 
nized as such by all the parties interested ? 

It is not necessary, then, to assume that all or most 
of the Sojinets were written before 1599, when The 
Passionate Pilgrim was published. Perhaps compara- 
tively few were then in existence ; and this may be one 
of the reasons why Jaggard was unable to get more of 
them for his sixpenny booklet. It would be easier to 
keep thirty or forty out of his reach among the poet's 
" private friends " than a hundred and fifty ; and Meres 
may not have had even as many as thirty in mind when 
he referred to the " sugred sonnets," in 1598. The 
others may have been scattered through several years 
after 1599 '■> an d some of those which seem independent 
of the regular series may have been written only a few 
years before the whole collection was published in 
1609. 

Mr. Lee dates some of the sonnets much later than 
1593-94. He believes, for instance, with Mr. Gerald 
Massey {Shakespeare 's Sonnets, 1866), that the 107th was 
written in 1603, and refers to the death of Elizabeth 
and the release of Southampton from prison on the 
accession of James. " The mortal moon " of the sonnet 
is Elizabeth, whose " recognized poetic appellation " 



Introduction 41 

was Cynthia (the moon) ; and her death is more than 
once described as an eclipse. But the sonnet tells us 
that the moon "hath her eclipse endured" and come 
out none the less bright — which could hardly refer to 
death ; and the supposed allusion to the imprisonment 
of the poet's friend is extremely fanciful. 

It may be added that Shakespeare's references to 
himself in the Sonnets as " old " appear to have a bear- 
ing on their date, and thus upon the question whether 
Herbert or Southampton was the person addressed. 
Thirty or more of them were written before 1599, when 
the poet was thirty-five years old, and the first seven- 
teen appear to have been written in 1597, when he was 
only thirty-three ; but in the 2 2d, which seems to be 
one of the earlier ones, he intimates that he is already 
old: — 

" My glass shall not persuade me I am old, 
So long as youth and thou are of one date; " 

but in the preceding sonnets he has repeatedly admon- 
ished his young friend that the summer of youth is fast 
flying, and has urged this as a reason why he should 
marry; "for," he says in substance, "you will soon be 
old, as I am." In the 73d we have a most beautiful and 
pathetic description of his own autumnal age : — 

" That time of year thou mayst in me behold 
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang 
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, 
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang." 



42 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

In the 138th, which was published in 1599, he refers to 
himself as "old" and his days as "past the best." 
We are told that here, as in some of the earlier sonnets, 
he is comparing himself, as a mature and experienced 
man, with a green youth of perhaps twenty. Thus in 
the 62d Sonnet, after referring to his own face as he 
sees it in the glass, " Bated and chopp'd with tann'd 
antiquity," he adds that he comforts himself by" Paint- 
ing my age with beauty of thy days." But in the 73d 
there is no contrast of his own age with that of his 
young friend, but a long-drawn and apparently heartfelt 
lament that his life has fallen into the sere and yellow 
leaf. Mr. Lee says that this " occasional reference to 
his growing age was a conventional device — traceable 
to Petrarch — of all sonneteers of the day, and admits 
of no literal interpretation." If the Sonnets were of the 
ordinary conventional Elizabethan type, poetical exer- 
cises on fictitious themes, we might think the " grow- 
ing age " equally fictitious ; but William Shakespeare, 
at twenty-nine or thirty (as Mr. Lee imagines him to 
have been when he wrote these sonnets), or even at 
thirty-five, was not the man to indulge in such senti- 
mental foolery — least of all through an entire sonnet — 
when dealing with real experiences like those which 
form the basis of these poems. 

However that may be, a man of twenty-eight or 
twenty-nine (as Shakespeare was in 1592 or 1593) 
writing to one of nineteen or twenty (as Southampton 
was in those years) would be less likely to assume that 



Introduction 43 

fictitiously exaggerated age than a man of thirty-three 
or thirty-four (in 1597 or 1598) writing to a youth of 
seventeen or eighteen, as Herbert then was. 

VIII. Who was the " Rival Poet " ? — Among the 
minor questions relating to the Sonnets which have 
been the subject of no little controversy the only one 
that seems to claim notice here is the identity of the 
" rival poet " of Sonnets 79-86. Spenser, Marlowe, 
Drayton, Nash, Daniel, and others have been suggested 
by the critics, and Mr. Lee adds Barnabe Barnes, " a 
poetic panegyrist of Southampton and a prolific sonnet- 
eer, who was deemed by contemporary critics certain 
to prove a great poet." On the whole, Chapman, 
whom Professor Minto was the first to suggest, and 
whom Dowden, Furnivall, and many others have en- 
dorsed, is most likely to have been the poet whom 
Shakespeare had in mind. Mr. Lee, having dated the 
Sonnets in 1592 and 1593, naturally objects that Chap- 
man had produced no conspicuously " great verse " 
until 1598, and that we find no complimentary sonnet 
addressed by him to Southampton until 1610 ; but he 
had published poetry before 1598, and that date is 
early enough for the Herbert theory, in which, of 
course, the failure to praise Southampton does not 
count. The question, nevertheless, is one that cannot 
be definitely settled. 

IX. Other Theories of the Sonnets. — Besides 
the autobiographical theories concerning the Sonnets 
many others, allegorical, mystical, and fantastical, have 



44 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

been proposed, which it would take too much space 
even to enumerate here ; neither is it possible to make 
more than a passing reference to the notions that " Mr. 
W. H." was William Hart, the poet's nephew (who was 
not born until a year after The Passionate Pilgrim was 
printed, and was only nine years old in 1609), William 
Hughes (on the strength of the capitalized and itali- 
cized Hues in the 20th Sonnet), " William Himself " (a 
German notion, revived by Mr. Parke Godwin in 1901), 
or Queen Elizabeth ; or that the poems are addressed 
to Ideal Manhood, or the Spirit of Beauty, or the 
Reason, or the Divine Logos ; or that the " dark lady " 
is Dramatic Art, or the Catholic Church, or the Bride 
of the Canticles, " black but comely." 1 

X. Conclusions. — It would be interesting, if space 
permitted, to consider the Sonnets as poems — to note 
the " linked sweetness long drawn out " of their verse, 
not unmixed with most sonorous music, and what Cole- 
ridge has aptly called their "boundless fertility and 
laboured condensation of thought ; " or to view them, in 
the words of Furnivall, " as a piece of music, or as 
Shakespeare's pathetic sonata, each melody introduced, 
dropped again, brought in again with variations, but 
one full strain of undying love and friendship running 
through the whole ; " but I can only close with a sum- 
ming up of what I have attempted to prove : — 

1 For some account of the " Baconian " theories see the Ap- 
pendix. 



Introduction 



45 



(i) That the Sonnets were not edited by Shakes- 
peare, but by some anonymous collector, who did not, 
and obviously could not, ask the poet or the persons to 
whom they were addressed for aid in settling a textual 
question. 

(2) That the arrangement of the Sonnets in the 
edition of 1609 was therefore not authoritative, but 
simply the best conjectural one that the collector could 
make, from a study of the poems and what he knew of 
their history ; and there is, moreover, internal evidence 
that the order is not strictly chronological. 

(3) That the great majority of the Sonnets are 
probably personal, or autobiographical, and were not 
intended for publication ; but it is not probable that 
the first 126 (or such of these as are personal) are all 
addressed to one man, and the rest to one woman, with 
whom Shakespeare and that man were entangled. 

(4) That " Mr. W. H." was probably the person to 
whom the Soiinets are addressed, rather than the one 
who collected and edited them ; and that, if so, he was 
probably William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke ; but the 
" dark lady," to whom most of the second series (127- 
152) were addressed, cannot be positively identified. 

(5) That while the majority of the Sonnets were 
probably written between 1597 and 1601, some of 
them, particularly those which are not connected with 
the main story, may be of later date. 



SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS 



TO. THE. ONLIE. BEGETTER. OF 

THESE. ENSVING. SONNETS. 

MR-W. H. ALL.HAPPINESSE. 

AND. THAT. ETERNITIE. 

PROMISED. 

BY. 

OVR. EVER-LIVING. POET. 

WISHETH. 

THE. WELL-WISHING. 

ADVENTVRER. IN. 

SETTING. 

FORTH . 



T T 




Head of Eros (from the Antique) 



SONNETS 



From fairest creatures we desire increase, 
That thereby beauty's rose might never die, 
But as the riper should by time decease, 
His tender heir might bear his memory ; 
But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes, 
Feed'st thy light's flame with self-substantial fuel, 
Making a famine where abundance lies, 
Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel. 
Thou, that art now the world's fresh ornament 
And only herald to the gaudy spring, 
Within thine own bud buriest thy content 
And, tender churl, mak'st waste in niggarding. 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 4 49 



50 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Pity the world, or else this glutton be, 

To eat the world's due, by the grave and thee. 

II. 

When forty winters shall besiege thy brow 
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field, 
Thy youth's proud livery, so gaz'd on now, 
Will be a tatter'd weed, of small worth held ; 
Then being ask'd where all thy beauty lies, 
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days, 
To say, within thine own deep-sunken eyes, 
Were an all-eating shame and thriftless praise. 
How much more praise deserv'd thy beauty's use 
If thou couldst answer ' This fair child of mine 
Shall sum my count and make my old excuse,' 
Proving his beauty by succession thine ! 

This were to be new made when thou art old, 
And see thy blood warm when thou feel'st it cold. 

III. 

Look in thy glass, and tell the face thou viewest 
Now is the time that face should form another, 
Whose fresh repair if now thou not renewest 
Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother. 
For where is she so fair whose unear'd womb 
Disdains the tillage of thy husbandry ? 
Or who is he so fond will be the tomb 
Of his self-love, to stop posterity ? 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 51 

Thou art thy mother's glass, and she in thee 
Calls back the lovely April of her prime ; 
So thou through windows of thine age shalt see, 
Despite of wrinkles, this thy golden time. 
But if thou live, remember'd not to be, 
Die single, and thine image dies with thee. 

IV. 

Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend 
Upon thyself thy beauty's legacy ? 
Nature's bequest gives nothing but doth lend, 
And being frank she lends to those are free. 
Then, beauteous niggard, why dost thou abuse 
The bounteous largess given thee to give ? 
Profitless usurer, why dost thou use 
So great a sum of sums, yet canst not live ? 
For, having traffic with thyself alone, 
Thou of thyself thy sweet self dost deceive. 
Then how, when nature calls thee to be gone, 
What acceptable audit canst thou leave ? 

Thy unus'd beauty must be tomb'd with thee, 
Which, used, lives the executor to be. 

V. 

Those hours that with gentle work did frame 
The lovely gaze where every eye doth dwell 
Will play the tyrants to the very same 
And that unfair which fairly doth excel ; 



2 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

For never-resting time leads summer on 

To hideous winter and confounds him there ; 

Sap check'd with frost and lusty leaves quite gone, 

Beauty o'ersnow'd and bareness every where. 

Then, were not summer's distillation left, 

A liquid prisoner pent in walls of glass, 

Beauty's effect with beauty were bereft, 

Nor it nor no remembrance what it was. 

But flowers distill'd, though they with winter meet, 
Leese but their show ; their substance still lives 
sweet. 

VI, 

Then let not winter's ragged hand deface 

In thee thy summer ere thou be distill'd. 

Make sweet some vial ; treasure thou some place 

With beauty's treasure ere it be self-kill'd. 

That use is not forbidden usury 

Which happies those that pay the willing loan ; 

That 's for thyself to breed another thee, 

Or ten times happier, be it ten for one. 

Ten times thyself were happier than thou art, 

If ten of thine ten times reflgur'd thee ; 

Then what could death do, if thou shouldst depart, 

Leaving thee living in posterity ? 

Be not self-will'd, for thou art much too fair 
To be death's conquest and make worms thine 
heir. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 53 



VII. 

Lo ! in the orient when the gracious light 
Lifts up his burning head, each under eye 
Doth homage to his new-appearing sight, 
Serving with looks his sacred majesty ; 
And having climb'd the steep-up heavenly hill, 
Resembling strong youth in his middle age, 
Yet mortal looks adore his beauty still, 
Attending on his golden pilgrimage. 
But when from highmost pitch, with weary car, 
Like feeble age, he reeleth from the day, 
The eyes, fore duteous, now converted are 
From his low tract and look another way ; 
So thou, thyself out-going in thy noon, 
Unlook'd on diest unless thou get a sod 

VIII. 

Music to hear, why hear'st thou music sadly ? 
Sweets with sweets war not, joy delights in joy. 
Why lov'st thou that which thou receiv'st not gladly, 
Or else receiv'st with pleasure thine annoy ? 
If the true concord of well-tuned sounds, 
By unions married, do offend thine ear, 
They do but sweetly chide thee, who confounds 
In singleness the parts that thou shouldst bear. 
Mark how one string, sweet husband to another, 
Strikes each in each by mutual ordering, 



54 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Resembling sire and child and happy mother, 
Who, all in one, one pleasing note do sing ; 

Whose speechless song, being many, seeming one, 
Sings this to thee : ' Thou single wilt prove none.' 

IX. 

Is it for fear to wet a widow's eye 
That thou consum'st thyself in single life ? 
Ah ! if thou issueless shalt hap to die, 
The world will wail thee, like a makeless wife ; 
The world will be thy widow and still weep 
That thou no form of thee hast left behind, 
W T hen every private widow well may keep 
By children's eyes her husband's shape in mind. 
Look, what an unthrift in the world doth spend 
Shifts but his place, for still the world enjoys it ; 
But beauty's waste hath in the world an end, 
And, kept unus'd, the user so destroys it. 
No love toward others in that bosom sits 
That on himself such murtherous shame commits. 

X. 

For shame ! deny that thou bear'st love to any, 
Who for thyself art so unprovident. 
Grant, if thou wilt, thou art belov'd of many, ^ 
But that thou none lov'st is most evident ; 
For thou art so possess'd with murtherous hate 
That 'gainst thyself thou stick'st not to conspire, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 55 

Seeking that beauteous roof to ruinate 

Which to repair should be thy chief desire. 

O, change thy thought, that I may change my mind ! 

Shall hate be fairer lodg'd than gentle love ? 

Be, as thy presence is, gracious and kind, 

Or to thyself at least kind-hearted prove ; 
Make thee another self, for love of me, 
That beauty still may live in thine or thee. 

XI. 

As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou growest 
In one of thine, from that which thou departest ; 
And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestowest 
Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth convertest. 
Herein lives wisdom, beauty, and increase; 
Without this, folly, age, and cold decay. 
If all were minded so, the times should cease 
And threescore year would make the world away. 
Let those whom Nature hath not made for store, 
Harsh, featureless, and rude, barrenly perish. 
Look, whom she best endow 'd she gave the more, 
Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish ; 
She carv'd thee for her seal, and meant thereby 
Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die. 

XII. 

When I do count the clock that tells the time, 
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night, 



56 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

When I behold the violet past prime, 
And sable curls all silver'd o'er with white, 
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves 
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, 
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves 
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard, 
Then of thy beauty do I question make, 
That thou among the wastes of time must go, 
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake 
And die as fast as they see others grow ; 

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence 
Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence. 



XIII. 

O, that you were yourself ! but, love, you are 

No longer yours than you yourself here live ; 

Against this coming end you should prepare, 

And your sweet semblance to some other give. 

So should that beauty which you hold in lease 

Find no determination ; then you were 

Yourself again after yourself 's decease, 

When your sweet issue your sweet form should bear. 

Who lets so fair a house fall to decay, 

Which husbandry in honour might uphold 

Against the stormy gusts of winter's day 

And barren rage of death's eternal cold ? 

O, none but unthrifts ! Dear my love, you know 
You had a father ; let your son say so. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 57 



XIV. 

Not from the stars do I my judgment pluck ; 
And yet methinks I have astronomy, 
But not to tell of good or evil luck, 
Of plagues, or dearths, or seasons' quality ; 
Nor can I fortune to brief minutes tell, 
Pointing to each his thunder, rain, and wind, 
Or say with princes if it shall go well, 
By oft predict that I in heaven find. 
But from thine eyes my knowledge I derive, 
And, constant stars, in them I read such art 
As truth and beauty shall together thrive, 
If from thyself to store thou wouldst convert ; 
Or else of thee this I prognosticate, — 
Thy end is truth's and beauty's doom and date. 

XV. 

When I consider every thing that grows 
Holds in perfection but a little moment, 
That this huge stage presenteth nought but shows 
Whereon the stars in secret influence comment ; 
When I perceive that men as plants increase, 
Cheered and check'd even by the selfsame sky, 
Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease, 
And wear their brave state out of memory ; 
Then the conceit of this inconstant stay 
Sets you most rich in youth before my sight, 



58 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Where wasteful Time debateth with Decay, 
To change your day of youth to sullied night, 
And all in war with Time for love of you, 
As he takes from you, I engraft you new. 

XVI. 

But wherefore do not you a mightier way 
Make war upon this bloody tyrant, Time ? 
And fortify yourself in your decay 
With means more blessed than my barren rhyme ? 
Now stand you on the top of happy hours, 
And many maiden gardens yet unset 
With virtuous wish would bear your living flowers, 
Much liker than your painted counterfeit ; 
So should the lines of life that life repair 
Which this time's pencil or my pupil pen, 
Neither in inward worth nor outward fair, 
Can make you live yourself in eyes of men. 
To give away yourself keeps yourself still, 
And you must live, drawn by your own sweet skill. 

XVII. 

Who will believe my verse in time to come, 

If it were fill'd with your most high deserts ? 

Though yet, heaven knows, it is but as a tomb 

Which hides your life and shows not half your parts. 

If I could write the beauty of your eyes 

And in fresh numbers number all your graces, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 59 

The age to come would say, ' This poet lies ; 
Such heavenly touches ne'er touch 'd earthly faces.' 
So should my papers, yellow'd with their age, 
Be scorn'd like old men of less truth than tongue, 
And your true rights be term'd a poet's rage 
And stretched metre of an antique song ; 

But were some child of yours alive that time, 
You should live twice, — in it and in my rhyme. 

XVIII. 

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day ? 
Thou art more lovely and more temperate. 
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, 
And summer's lease hath all too short a date ; 
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, 
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd ; 
And every fair from fair sometime declines, 
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd. 
But thy eternal summer shall not fade 
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest ; 
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, 
When in eternal lines to time thou growest. 
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, 
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. 

XIX. 

Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws, 
And make the earth devour her own sweet brood ; 



60 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws, 
And burn the long-liv'd phoenix in her blood ; 
Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleets, 
And do whate'er thou wilt, swift-footed Time, 
To the wide world and all her fading sweets ; 
But I forbid thee one most heinous crime : 
O, carve not with thy hours my love's fair brow, 
Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen ; 
Him in thy course untainted do allow 
For beauty's pattern to succeeding men. 

Yet, do thy worst, old Time ; despite thy wrong, 
My love shall in my verse ever live young. 

XX. 

A woman's face with Nature's own hand painted 

Hast thou, the master-mistress of my passion ; 

A woman's gentle heart, but not acquainted 

With shifting change, as is false women's fashion ; 

An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling, 

Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth ; 

A man in hue, all hues in his controlling, 

Which steals men's eyes and women's souls amazeth. 

And for a woman wert thou first created ; 

Till Nature, as she wrought thee, fell a-doting, 

And by addition me of thee defeated, 

By adding one thing to my purpose nothing. 

But since she prick'd thee out for women's pleasure, 
Mine be thy love, and thy love's use their treasure. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 61 

XXI. 

So is it not with me as with that Muse, 

Stirr'd by a painted beauty to his verse, 

Who heaven itself for ornament doth use 

And every fair with his fair doth rehearse ; 

Making a couplement of proud compare, 

With sun and moon, with earth and sea's rich gems, 

With April's first-born flowers, and all things rare 

That heaven's air in this huge rondure hems. 

O, let me, true in love, but truly write, 

And then believe me, my love is as fair 

As any mother's child, though not so bright 

As those gold candles fix'd in heaven's air. 

Let them say more that like of hearsay well ; 

I will not praise that purpose not to sell. 

XXII. 

My glass shall not persuade me I am old 
So long as youth and thou are of one date ; 
But when in thee time's furrows I behold, 
Then look I death my days should expiate. 
For all that beauty that doth cover thee 
Is but the seemly raiment of my heart, 
Which in thy breast doth live, as thine in me ; 
How can I then be elder than thou art ? 
O, therefore, love, be of thyself so wary 
As I, not for myself, but for thee will ; 



6i Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Bearing thy heart, which I will keep so chary 
As tender nurse her babe from faring ill. 

Presume not on thy heart when mine is slain ; 

Thou gav'st me thine, not to give back again. 

XXIII. 

As an unperfect actor on the stage, 

Who with his fear is put besides his part, 

Or some fierce thing replete with too much rage, 

Whose strength's abundance weakens his own heart, 

So I, for fear of trust, forget to say 

The perfect ceremony of love's rite, 

And in mine own love's strength seem to decay, 

O'ercharg'd with burden of mine own love's might. 

O, let my books be then the eloquence 

And dumb presagers of my speaking breast, 

Who plead for love and look for recompense 

More than that tongue that more hath more express 'd. 

O, learn to read what silent love hath writ ! 

To hear with eyes belongs to love's fine wit. 

XXIV. 

Mine eye hath play'd the painter and hath stell'd 

Thy beauty's form in table of my heart ; 

My body is the frame wherein 't is held, 

And perspective it is best painter's art. 

For through the painter must you see his skill, 

To find where your true image pictur'd lies, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 63 

Which in my bosom's shop is hanging still 
That hath his windows glazed with thine eyes. 
Now see what good turns eyes for eyes have done : 
Mine eyes have drawn thy shape, and thine for me 
Are windows to my breast, where through the sun 
Delights to peep, to gaze therein on thee ; 

Yet eyes this cunning want to grace their art, — 
They draw but what they see, know not the heart. 

XXV. 

Let those who are in favour with their stars 
Of public honour and proud titles boast, 
Whilst I, whom fortune of such triumph bars, 
Unlook'd for joy in that I honour most. 
Great princes' favourites their fair leaves spread 
But as the marigold at the sun's eye, 
And in themselves their pride lies buried, 
For at a frown they in their glory die. 
The painful warrior famoused for fight, 
After a thousand victories once foil'd, 
Is from the book of honour razed quite, 
And all the rest forgot for which he toil'd ; 
Then happy I, that love and am belov'd 
Where I may not remove nor be remov'd. 

XXVI. 

Lord of my love, to whom in vassalage 
Thy merit hath my duty strongly knit, 



64 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

To thee I send this written embassage, 

To witness duty, not to show my wit ; 

Duty so great which wit so poor as mine 

May make seem bare, in wanting words to show it, 

But that I hope some good conceit of thine 

In thy soul's thought, all naked, will bestow it, 

Till whatsoever star that guides my moving 

Points on me graciously with fair aspect, 

And puts apparel on my tatter'd loving, 

To show me worthy of thy sweet respect. 

Then may I dare to boast how I do love thee ; 

Till then not show my head where thou mayst prove 
me. 

XXVII. 

Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed, 

The dear repose for limbs with travel tir'd, 

But then begins a journey in my head, 

To work my mind when body's work 's expir'd ; 

For then my thoughts, from far where I abide, 

Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee, 

And keep my drooping eyelids open wide, 

Looking on darkness which the blind do see ; 

Save that my soul's imaginary sight 

Presents thy shadow to my sightless view, 

Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night, 

Makes black night beauteous and her old face new. 

Lo ! thus, by day my limbs, by night my mind, 

For thee and for myself no quiet find. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 65 



XXVIII. 

How can I then return in happy plight, 
That am debarr'd the benefit of rest ? 
When clay's oppression is not eas'd by night, 
But day by night, and night by day, oppress'd : 
And each, though enemies to either's reign, 
Do in consent shake hands to torture me ; 
The one by toil, the other to complain 
How far I toil, still farther off from thee. 
I tell the day, to please him thou art bright 
And dost him grace when clouds do blot the heaven ; 
So flatter I the swart-complexion'd night, 
When sparkling stars twire not thou gild'st the even. 
But day doth daily draw my sorrows longer, 
And night doth nightly make grief's strength seem 
stronger. 

XXIX. 

When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, 

I all alone beweep my outcast state, 

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries, 

And look upon myself and curse my fate, 

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, 

Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess 'd, 

Desiring this man's art and that man's scope, 

With what I most enjoy contented least ; 

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising, 

Haply I think on thee, and then my state, 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 5 



66 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Like to the lark at break of day arising 
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate ; 
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings 
That then I scorn to change my state with kings. 

XXX. 

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought 

I summon up remembrance of things past, 

I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought, 

And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste. 

Then can I drown an eye, unus'd to flow, 

For precious friends hid in death's dateless night, 

And weep afresh love's long since cancell'd woe,. 

And moan the expense of many a vanish 'd sight, 

Then can I grieve at grievances foregone, 

And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er 

The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan, 

Which I new pay as if not paid before. 

But if the while I think on thee, dear friend, 
All losses are restor'd and sorrows end. 

XXXI. 

Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts 

Which I by lacking have supposed dead, 

And there reigns love and all love's loving parts, 

And all those friends which I thought buried. 

How many a holy and obsequious tear 

Hath dear religious love stolen from mine eye 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 67 

As interest of the dead, which now appear 
But things remov'd that hidden in thee lie ! 
Thou art the grave where buried love doth live, 
Hung with the trophies of my lovers gone, 
Who all their parts of me to thee did give, 
That due of many now is thine alone ; 
Their images I lov'd I view in thee, 
And thou, all they, hast all the all of me. 

XXXII. 

If thou survive my well-contented day, 
When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover, 
And shalt by fortune once more re-survey 
These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover, 
Compare them with the bettering of the time, 
And though they be outstripp'd by every pen, 
Reserve them for my love, not for their rhyme, 
Exceeded by the height of happier men. 
O, then vouchsafe me but this loving thought : 
' Had my friend's Muse grown with this growing age, 
A dearer birth than this his love had brought, 
To march in ranks of better equipage ; 
But since he died and poets better prove, 
Theirs for their style I '11 read, his for his love.' 

XXXIII. 

Full many a glorious morning have I seen 
Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye, 



68 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Kissing with golden face the meadows green, 

Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy, 

Anon permit the basest clouds to ride 

With ugly rack on his celestial face, 

And from the forlorn world his visage hide, 

Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace. 

Even so my sun one early morn did shine 

With all-triumphant splendour on my brow, 

But out, alack ! he was but one hour mine, 

The region cloud hath mask'd him from me now. 

Yet him for this my love no whit disdaineth ; 

Suns of the world may stain when heaven's sun 
staineth. 

XXXIV.'^ 

Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day 

And make me travel forth without my cloak, 

To let base clouds o'ertake me in my way, 

Hiding thy bravery in their rotten smoke ? 

'T is not enough that through the cloud thou break, 

To dry the rain on my storm-beaten face, 

For no man well of such a salve can speak 

That heals the wound and cures not the disgrace. 

Nor can thy shame give physic to my grief ; 

Though thou repent, yet I have still the loss. 

The offender's sorrow lends but weak relief 

To him that bears the strong offence's cross. 

Ah ! but those tears are pearl which thy love sheds, 
And they are rich and ransom all ill deeds. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 69 

XXXV. 

No more be griev'd at that which thou hast done ; 
Roses have thorns and silver fountains mud, 
Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun, 
And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud. 
All men make faults, and even I in this, 
Authorizing thy trespass with compare, 
Myself corrupting, salving thy amiss, 
Excusing thy sins more than thy sins are ; 
For to thy sensual fault I bring in sense — 
Thy adverse party is thy advocate — 
And 'gainst myself a lawful plea commence. 
Such civil war is in my love and hate 
That I an accessary needs must be 
To that sweet thief which sourly robs from me. 

XXXVI. 

Let me confess that we two must be twain, 

Although our undivided loves are one ; 

So shall those blots that do with me remain 

Without thy help by me be borne alone. 

In our two loves there is but one respect, 

Though in our lives a separable spite, 

Which though it alter not love's sole effect, 

Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight. 

I may not evermore acknowledge thee, 

Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame, 



70 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Nor thou with public kindness honour me, 
Unless thou take that honour from thy name. 
But do not so ; I love thee in such sort 
As, thou being mine, mine is thy good report. 

XXXVII. 

As a decrepit father takes delight 

To see his active child do deeds of youth, 

So I, made lame by fortune's dearest spite, 

Take all my comfort of thy worth and truth ; 

For whether beauty, birth, or wealth, or wit, 

Or any of these all, or all, or more, 

Entitled in thy parts do crowned sit, 

I make my love engrafted to this store. 

So then I am not lame, poor, nor despis'd, 

Whilst that this shadow doth such substance give 

That I in thy abundance am suffic'd 

And by a part of all thy glory live. 

Look, what is best, that best I wish in thee ; 

This wish I have, then ten times happy me ! 

XXXVIII. 

How can my Muse want subject to invent, 

While thou dost breathe that pour'st into my verse 

Thine own sweet argument, too excellent 

For every vulgar paper to rehearse ? 

O, give thyself the thanks if aught in me 

Worthy perusal stand against thy sight ; 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 71 

For who 's so dumb that cannot write to thee, 
When thou thyself dost give invention light ? 
Be thou the tenth Muse, ten times more in worth 
Than those old nine which rhymers invocate ; 
And he that calls on thee, let him bring forth 
Eternal numbers to outlive long date. 

If my slight Muse do please these curious days, 
The pain be mine, but thine shall be the praise. 

XXXIX. 

O, how thy worth with manners may I sing 
When thou art all the better part of me ? 
What can mine own praise to mine own self bring ? 
And what is 't but mine own when I praise thee ? 
Even for this let us divided live, 
And our dear love lose name of single one, 
That by this separation I may give 
That due to thee which thou deserv'st alone. 
O absence, what a torment wouldst thou prove, 
Were it not thy sour leisure gave sweet leave 
To entertain the time with thoughts of love, 
W T hich time and thoughts so sweetly doth deceive, 
And that thou teachest how to make one twain 
By praising him here who doth hence remain ! 

XL. 

Take all my loves, my love, yea, take them all ; 
What hast thou then more than thou hadst before ? 



72 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

No love, my love, that thou mayst true love call ; 
All mine was thine before thou hadst this more. 
Then if for my love thou my love receivest, 
I cannot blame thee for my love thou usest ; 
But yet be blam'd, if thou thyself deceivest 
By wilful taste of what thyself refusest. 
I do forgive thy robbery, gentle thief, 
Although thou steal thee all my poverty ; 
And yet, love knows, it is a greater grief 
To bear love's wrong than hate's known injury. 
Lascivious grace, in whom all ill well shows, 
Kill me with spites ; yet we must not be foes. 

XLI. 

Those pretty wrongs that liberty commits, 
When I am sometime absent from thy heart, 
Thy beauty and thy years full well befits, 
For still temptation follows where thou art. 
Gentle thou art and therefore to be won, 
Beauteous thou art, therefore to be assail'd ; 
And when a woman wooes what woman's son 
Will sourly leave her till she have prevail'd ? 
Ay me ! but yet thou mightst my seat forbear, 
And chide thy beauty and thy straying youth, 
Who lead thee in their riot even there 
Where thou art forc'd to break a twofold truth, — 
Hers, by thy beauty tempting her to thee, 
Thine, by thy beauty being false to me. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 73 



XLII. 

That thou hast her, it is not all my grief, 

And yet it may be said I lov'd her dearly ; 

That she hath thee is of my wailing chief, 

A loss in love that touches me more nearly. 

Loving offenders, thus I will excuse ye : 

Thou dost love her because thou know'st I love her ; 

And for my sake even so doth she abuse me, 

Suffering my friend for my sake to approve her. 

If I lose thee, my loss is my love's gain, 

And losing her, my friend hath found that loss ; 

Both find each other, and I lose both twain, 

And both for my sake lay on me this cross. 

But here's the joy : my friend and I are one ; 

Sweet flattery ! then she loves but me alone. 

XLIII. 

When most I wink, then do mine eyes best see, 
For all the day they view things unrespected ; 
But when I sleep, in dreams they look on thee, 
And darkly bright are bright in dark directed. 
Then thou, whose shadow shadows doth make bright, 
How would thy shadow's form form happy, show 
To the clear day with thy much clearer light, 
When to unseeing eyes thy shade shines so ! 
How would, I say, mine eyes be blessed made 
By looking on thee in the living day, 



74 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

When in dead night thy fair imperfect shade 
Through heavy sleep on sightless eyes doth stay ! 
All days are nights to see till I see thee, 
And nights bright days when dreams do show thee 
me. 

XLIV. 

If the dull substance of my flesh were thought, 
Injurious distance should not stop my way ; 
For then despite of space I would be brought, 
From limits far remote, where thou dost stay. 
No matter then although my foot did stand 
Upon the farthest earth remov'd from thee ; 
For nimble thought can jump both sea and land 
As soon as think the place where he would be. 
But, ah ! thought kills me that I am not thought, 
To leap large lengths of miles when thou art gone, 
But that, so much of earth and water wrought, 
I must attend time's leisure with my moan, 
Receiving nought by elements so slow 
But heavy tears, badges of either's woe. 

XLV. 

The other two, slight air and purging fire, 
Are both with thee, wherever I abide ; 
The first my thought, the other my desire, 
These present-absent with swift motion slide. 
For when these quicker elements are gone 
In tender embassy of love to thee. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 75 

My life, being made of four, with two alone 
Sinks down to death, oppress 'd with melancholy ; 
Until life's composition be recur'd 
By those swift messengers return'd from thee, 
Who even but now come back again, assur'd 
Of thy fair health, recounting it to me. 

This told, I joy ; but then, no longer glad, 

I send them back again, and straight grow sad. 

XL VI. 

Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war 

How to divide the conquest of thy sight ; 

Mine eye my heart thy picture's sight would bar, 

My heart mine eye the freedom of that right. 

My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie, — 

A closet never pierc'd with crystal eyes, — 

But the defendant doth that plea deny, 

And says in him thy fair appearance lies. 

To 'cide this title is impanelled 

A quest of thoughts, all tenants to the heart, 

And by their verdict is determined 

The clear eye's moiety and the dear heart's part; 
As thus : mine eye's due is thy outward part, 
And my heart's right thy inward love of heart. 

XLVII. 

Betwixt mine eye and heart a league is took, 
And each doth good turns now unto the other. 



y6 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

When that mine eye is famish 'd for a look, 
Or heart in love with sighs himself doth smother, 
With my love's picture then my eye doth feast 
And to the painted banquet bids my heart ; 
Another time mine eye is my heart's guest 
And in his thoughts of love doth share a part. 
So, either by thy picture or my love, 
Thyself away art present still with me ; 
For thou not farther than my thoughts canst move, 
And I am still with them and they with thee, 
Or, if they sleep, thy picture in my sight 
Awakes my heart to heart's and eye's delight. 

XLVIII. 

How careful was I, when I took my way, 
Each trifle under truest bars to thrust, 
That to my use it might unused stay 
From hands of falsehood, in sure wards of trust ! 
But thou, to whom my jewels trifles are, 
Most worthy comfort, now my greatest grief, 
Thou, best of dearest and mine only care, 
Art left the prey of every vulgar thief. 
Thee have I not lock'd up in any chest, 
Save where thou art not, though I feel thou art, 
Within the gentle closure of my breast, 
From whence at pleasure thou mayst come and part ; 
And even thence thou wilt be stolen, I fear, 
For truth proves thievish for a prize so dear. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 77 



XLIX. 

Against that time, if ever that time come, 
When I shall see thee frown on my defects, 
Whenas thy love hath cast his utmost sum, 
Call'd to that audit by advis'd respects ; 
Against that time when thou shalt strangely pass 
And scarcely greet me with that sun, thine eye, 
When love, converted from the thing it was, 
Shall reasons find of settled gravity, — 
Against that time do I ensconce me here 
Within the knowledge of mine own desert, 
And this my hand against myself uprear, 
To guard the lawful reasons on thy part : 

To leave poor me thou hast the strength of laws, 
Since why to love I can allege no cause. 

L. 

How heavy do I journey on the way, 

When what I seek, my weary travel's end, 

Doth teach that ease and that repose to say, 

1 Thus far the miles are measur'd from thy friend ! 

The beast that bears me, tired with my woe, 

Plods dully on, to bear that weight in me, 

As if by some instinct the wretch did know 

His rider lov'd not speed, being made from thee. 

The bloody spur cannot provoke him on 

That sometimes anger thrusts into his hide, 



7$ Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Which heavily he answers with a groan, 
More sharp to me than spurring to his side ; 

For that same groan doth put this in my mind, — 
My grief lies onward and my joy behind. 

LI. 

Thus can my love excuse the slow offence 
Of my dull bearer when from thee I speed : 
From where thou art why should I haste me thence ? 
Till I return, of posting is no need. 
O, what excuse will my poor beast then find, 
When swift extremity can seem but slow? 
Then should I spur, though mounted on the wind ; 
In winged speed no motion shall I know. 
Then can no horse with my desire keep pace ; 
Therefore desire, of perfect'st love being made, 
Shall neigh — no dull flesh — in his fiery race ; 
But love, for love, thus shall excuse my jade : 
Since from thee going he went wilful-slow, 
Towards thee I '11 run, and give him leave to go. 

LII. 

So am I as the rich, whose blessed key 
Can bring him to his sweet up-locked treasure, 
The which he will not every hour survey, 
For blunting the fine point of seldom pleasure. 
Therefore are feasts so solemn and so rare, 
Since, seldom coming, in the long year set, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 79 

Like stones of worth they thinly placed are, 
Or captain jewels in the carcanet. 
So is the time that keeps you as my chest, 
Or as the wardrobe which the robe doth hide, 
To make some special instant special blest 
By new unfolding his imprison 'd pride. 

Blessed are you whose worthiness gives scope, 
Being had, to triumph, being lack'd, to hope. 

LIIL 

What is your substance, whereof are you made, 
That millions of strange shadows on you tend ? 
Since every one hath, every one, one shade, 
And you, but one, can every shadow lend. 
Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit 
Is poorly imitated after you ; 
On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set, 
And you in Grecian tires are painted new. 
Speak of the spring and foison of the year, 
The one doth shadow of your beauty show, 
The other as your bounty doth appear ; 
And you in every blessed shape we know. 
In all external grace you have some part, 
But you like none, none you, for constant heart. 

LIV. 

O, how much more doth beauty beauteous seem 
By that sweet ornament which truth doth give ! 



80 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem 
For that sweet odour which doth in it live. 
The canker-blooms have full as deep a dye 
As the perfumed tincture of the roses, 
Hang on such thorns, and play as wantonly 
When summer's breath their masked buds discloses ; 
But, for their virtue only is their show, 
They live unwoo'd and unrespected fade, 
Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not so ; 
Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odours made. 
And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth, 
When that shall vade, my verse distills your truth. 



LV. 

Not marble, nor the gilded monuments 
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme ; 
But you shall shine more bright in these contents 
Than unswept stone besmear'd with sluttish time. 
When wasteful war shall statues overturn, 
And broils root out the work of masonry, 
Nor Mars his sword nor war's quick fire shall burn 
The living record of your memory. 
'Gainst death and all-oblivious enmity 
Shall you pace forth ; your praise shall still find room 
Even in the eyes of all posterity 
That wear this world out to the ending doom. 
So, till the judgment that yourself arise, 
You live in this, and dwell in lovers' eyes. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 81 



LVI. 

Sweet love, renew thy force ; be it not said 
Thy edge should blunter be than appetite, 
Which but to-day by feeding is allay'd, 
To-morrow sharpen 'd in his former might. 
So, love, be thou ; although to-day thou fill 
Thy hungry eyes even till they wink with fullness, 
To-morrow see again, and do not kill 
The spirit of love with a perpetual dullness. 
Let this sad interim like the ocean be 
Which parts the shore where two contracted new 
Come daily to the banks, that, when they see 
Return of love, more blest may be the view ; 
Else call it winter, which being full of care 
Makes summer's welcome thrice more wish'd, more 
rare. 

LVII. 

Being your slave, what should I do but tend 
Upon the hours and times of your desire ? 
I have no precious time at all to spend, 
Nor services to do, till you require. 
Nor dare I chide the world-without-end hour 
Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you, 
Nor think the bitterness of absence sour 
When you have bid your servant once adieu ; 
Nor dare I question with my jealous thought 
Where you may be, or your affairs suppose, 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 6 



82 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

But, like a sad slave, stay and think of nought 
Save, where you are how happy you make those. 
So true a fool is love that in your will, 
Though you do any thing, he thinks no ill. 

LVIIL 

That god forbid that made me first your slave, 

I should in thought control your times of pleasure, 

Or at your hand the account of hours to crave, 

Being your vassal, bound to stay your leisure ! 

O, let me suffer, being at your beck, 

The imprison 'd absence of your liberty; 

And patience, tame to sufferance, bide each check, 

Without accusing you of injury ! 

Be where you list, your charter is so strong 

That you yourself may privilege your time 

To what you will ; to you it doth belong 

Yourself to pardon of self-doing crime. 

I am to wait, though waiting so be hell ; 

Not blame your pleasure, be it ill or well. 

LIX. 

If there be nothing new, but that which is 
Hath been before, how are our brains beguil'd, 
Which, labouring for invention, bear amiss 
The second burthen of a former child ! 
O, that record could with a backward look, 
Even of five hundred courses of the sun, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 83 

Show me your image in some antique book, 
Since mind at first in character was done ! 
That I might see what the old world could say 
To this composed wonder of your frame ; 
Whether we are mended, or whether better they, 
Or whether revolution be the same. 
O, sure I am, the wits of former days 
To subjects worse have given admiring praise. 

LX. 

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore, 
So do our minutes hasten to their end ; 
Each changing place with that which goes before, 
In sequent toil all forwards do contend. 
Nativity, once in the main of light, 
Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown 'd, 
Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight, 
And Time that gave doth now his gift confound. 
Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth 
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow, 
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth, 
And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow ; 
And yet to times in hope my verse shall stand, 
Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand. 

LXI. 

Is it thy will thy image should keep open 
My heavy eyelids to the weary night ? 



84 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Dost thou desire my slumbers should be broken, 
While shadows like to thee do mock my sight ? 
Is it thy spirit that thou send'st from thee 
So far from home into my deeds to pry, 
To find out shames and idle hours in me, 
The scope and tenor of thy jealousy ? 
O, no ! thy love, though much, is not so great : 
It is my love that keeps mine eye awake ; 
Mine own true love that doth my rest defeat, 
To play the watchman ever for thy sake. 

For thee watch I whilst thou dost wake elsewhere, 
From me far off, with others all too near. 

LXII. 

Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye 
And all my soul and all my every part ; 
And for this sin there is no remedy, 
It is so grounded inward in my heart. 
Methinks no face so gracious is as mine, 
No shape so true, no truth of such account, 
And for myself mine own worth do define, 
As I all other in all worths surmount. 
But when my glass shows me myself indeed, 
Bated and chopp'd with tann'd antiquity, 
Mine own self-love quite contrary I read ; 
Self so self-loving were iniquity. 

'T is thee, myself, that for myself I praise, 
Painting my age with beauty of thy days. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 85 



LXIII. 

Against my love shall be, as I am now, 
With Time's injurious hand crush'd and o'erworn, 
When hours have drain'd his blood and fill'd his brow 
With lines and wrinkles, when his youthful morn 
Hath travell'd on to age's steepy night, 
And all those beauties whereof now he 's king 
Are vanishing or vanish'd out of sight, 
Stealing away the treasure of his spring — 
For such a time do I now fortify 
Against confounding age's cruel knife, 
That he shall never cut from memory 
My sweet love's beauty, though my lover's life ; 
His beauty shall in these black lines be seen, 
And they shall live, and he in them still green. 

LXIV. 

When I have seen by Time's fell hand defac'd 
The rich proud cost of outworn buried age, 
When sometime lofty towers I see down-ras'd 
And brass eternal slave to mortal rage, 
When I have seen the hungry ocean gain 
Advantage on the kingdom of the shore, 
And the firm soil win of the watery main, 
Increasing store with loss and loss with store, — 
When I have seen such interchange of state, 
Or state itself confounded to decay, 



86 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate, 
That Time will come and take my love away. 
This thought is as a death, which cannot choose 
But weep to have that which it fears to lose. 

LXV. 

Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, 
But sad mortality o'er-sways their power, 
How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, 
Whose action is no stronger than a flower ? 
O, how shall summer's honey breath hold out 
Against the wrackful siege of battering days, 
When rocks impregnable are not so stout, 
Nor gates of steel so strong, but Time decays ? 
O fearful meditation ! where, alack, 
Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid ? 
Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back ? 
Or who his spoil of. beauty can forbid ? 
O, none, unless this miracle have might, 
That in black ink my love may still shine bright. 

LXVI. 

Tir'd with all these, for restful death I cry, — 
As, to behold desert a beggar born, 
And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity, 
And purest faith unhappily forsworn, 
And gilded honour shamefully misplac'd, 
And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 87 

And right perfection wrongfully disgrac'd, 

And strength by limping sway disabled, 

And art made tongue-tied by authority, 

And folly doctor-like controlling skill, 

And simple truth miscall'd simplicity, 

And captive good attending captain ill ; 

Tir'd with all these, from these would I be gone, 
Save that, to die, I leave my love alone. 

LXVII. 

Ah ! wherefore with infection should he live, 

And with his presence grace impiety, 

That sin by him advantage should achieve 

And lace itself with his society ? 

Why should false painting imitate his cheek, 

And steal dead seeing of his living hue ? 

Why should poor beauty indirectly seek 

Roses of shadow, since his rose is true ? 

Why should he live, now Nature bankrupt is, 

Beggar'd of blood to blush through lively veins ? 

For she hath no exchequer now but his, 

And, proud of many, lives upon his gains. 

O, him she stores, to show what wealth she had 
In days long since, before these last so bad ! 

LXVIII. 

Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn, 
When beauty liv'd and died as flowers do now, 



88 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Before these bastard signs of fair were born, 

Or durst inhabit on a living brow ; 

Before the golden tresses of the dead, 

The right of sepulchres, were shorn away, 

To live a second life on second head ; 

Ere beauty's dead fleece made another gay. 

In him those holy antique hours are seen, 

Without all ornament, itself and true, 

Making no summer of another's green, 

Robbing no old to dress his beauty new ; 
And him as for a map doth Nature store, 
To show false Art what beauty was of yore. 

LXIX. 

Those parts of thee that the world's eye doth view 

Want nothing that the thought of hearts can mend ; 

All tongues, the voice of souls, give thee that due, 

Uttering bare truth, even so as foes commend. 

Thy outward thus with outward praise is crown'd, 

But those same tongues that give thee so thine own 

In other accents do this praise confound 

By seeing farther than the eye hath shown. 

They look into the beauty of thy mind, 

And that, in guess, they measure by thy deeds ; 

Then, churls, their thoughts, although their eyes were 

kind, 
To thy fair flower add the rank smell of weeds ; 
But why thy odour matcheth not thy show, 
The soil is this, that thou dost common grow. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 89 



LXX. 

That thou art blam'd shall not be thy defect, 
For slander's mark was ever yet the fair ; 
The ornament of beauty is suspect, 
A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air. 
So thou be good, slander doth but approve 
Thy worth the greater, being woo'd of time ; 
For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love, 
And thou present'st a pure unstained prime. 
Thou hast pass'd by the ambush of young days, 
Either not assail'd or victor being charg'd, 
Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise 
To tie up envy evermore enlarg'd ; 

If some suspect of ill mask'd not thy show, 

Then thou alone kingdoms of hearts shouldst owe. 

LXXI. 

No longer morn for me when I am dead 

Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell 

Give warning to the world that I am fled 

From this vile world, with vilest worms to dwell ; 

Nay, if you read this line, remember not 

The hand that writ it, for I love you so 

That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot 

If thinking on me then should make you woe. 

O, if, I say, you look upon this verse 

When I perhaps compounded am with clay, 



90 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Do not so much as my poor name rehearse, 
But let your love even with my life decay, 

Lest the wise world should look into your moan 
And mock you with me after I am gone. 

LXXII. 

O, lest the world should task you to recite 
What merit liv'd in me that you should love 
After my death, dear love, forget me quite, 
For you in me can nothing worthy prove ; 
Unless you would devise some virtuous lie, 
To do more for me than mine own desert, 
And hang more praise upon deceased I 
Than niggard truth would willingly impart. 
O, lest your true love may seem false in this, 
That you for love speak well of me untrue, 
My name be buried where my body is, 
And live no more to shame nor me nor you ! 
For I am sham'd by that which I bring forth, 
And so should you, to love things nothing worth. 

LXXIII. 

That time of year thou mayst in me behold 
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang 
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, 
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. 
In me thou seest the twilight of such day 
As after sunset fadeth in the west, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 91 

Which by and by black night doth take away, 
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. 
In me thou seest the glowing of such fire 
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, 
As the death-bed whereon it must expire, 
Consum'd with that which it was nourish 'd by. 

This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong, 
To love that well which thou must leave ere long. 

LXXIV. 

But be contented ; when that fell arrest 

Without all bail shall carry me away, 

My life hath in this line some interest 

Which for memorial still with thee shall stay. 

When thou reviewest this, thou dost review 

The very part was consecrate to thee : 

The earth can have but earth, which is his due ; 

My spirit is thine, the better part of me. 

So then thou hast but lost the dregs of life, 

The prey of worms, my body being dead, 

The coward conquest of a wretch's knife, 

Too base of thee to be remembered. 

The worth of that is that which it contains, 
And that is this, and this with thee remains. 

LXXV. 

So are you to my thoughts as food to life, 

Or as sweet-season 'd showers are to the ground ; 



9 2 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

And for the peace of you I hold such strife 

As : twixt a miser and his wealth is found : 

Now proud as an enjoyer, and anon 

Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure ; 

Now counting best to be with you alone, 

Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure 

Sometime all full with feasting on your sight, 

And by and by clean starved for a look ; 

Possessing or pursuing no delight 

Save what is had or must from you be took 

Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day, 

Or gluttoning on all, or all away. 



LXXVI. 

Why is my verse so barren of new pride, 
So far from variation or quick change ? 
Why with the time do I not glance aside 
To new-found methods and to compounds strange ? 
Why write I still all one, ever the same, 
And keep invention in a noted weed, 
That every word doth almost tell my name, 
Showing their birth and where they did proceed ? 
O, know, sweet love, I always write of you, 
And you and love are still my argument, 
So all my best is dressing old words new, 
Spending again what is already spent ; 
For as the sun is daily new and old, 
So is my love still telling what is told. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 93 



LXXVII. 

Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear, 
Thy dial how thy precious minutes waste ; 
The vacant leaves thy mind's imprint will bear, 
And of this book this learning mayst thou taste. 
The wrinkles which thy glass will truly show 
Of mouthed graves will give thee memory ; 
Thou by thy dial's shady stealth mayst know 
Time's thievish progress to eternity. 
Look, what thy memory can not contain 
Commit to these waste blanks, and thou shalt find 
Those children nurs'd, deliver'd from thy brain, 
To take a new acquaintance of thy mind. 
These offices, so oft as thou wilt look, 
Shall profit thee and much enrich thy book. 

LXXVIII. 

So oft have I invok'd thee for my Muse, 

And found such fair assistance in my verse, 

As every alien pen hath got my use 

And under thee their poesy disperse. 

Thine eyes, that taught the dumb on high to sing 

And heavy ignorance aloft to fly, 

Have added feathers to the learned 's wing 

And given grace a double majesty, 

Yet be most proud of that which I compile, 

Whose influence is thine and born of thee ; 



94 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

In others' works thou dost but mend the style, 
And arts with thy sweet graces graced be, 
But thou art all my art, and dost advance 
As high as learning my rude ignorance. 

LXXIX, 

Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid, 
My verse alone had all thy gentle grace, 
But now my gracious numbers are decay'd, 
And my sick Muse doth give another place. 
I grant, sweet love, thy lovely argument 
Deserves the travail of a worthier pen, 
Yet what of thee thy poet doth invent 
He robs thee of and pays it thee again. 
He lends thee virtue, and he stole that word 
From thy behaviour ; beauty doth he give, 
And found it in thy cheek ; he can afford 
No praise to thee but what in thee doth live. 
Then thank him not for that which he doth say, 
Since what he owes thee thou thyself dost pay. 

LXXX. 

O, how I faint when I of you do write, 
Knowing a better spirit doth use your name, 
And in the praise thereof spends all his might, 
To make me tongue-tied, speaking of your fame ! 
But since your worth, wide as the ocean is, 
The humble as the proudest sail doth bear, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 95 

My saucy bark, inferior far to his, 

On your broad main doth wilfully appear. 

Your shallowest help will hold me up aloft, 

Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride ; 

Or, being wrack'd, I am a worthless boat, 

He of tall building and of goodly pride. 
Then if he thrive and. I be cast away, 
The worst was this, — my love was my decay. 

LXXXI. 

Or I shall live your epitaph to make, 
Or you survive when I in earth am rotten ; 
From hence your memory death cannot take, 
Although in me each part will be forgotten. 
Your name from hence immortal life shall have, 
Though I, once gone, to all the world must die ; 
The earth can yield me but a common grave, 
When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie. 
Your monument shall be my gentle verse, 
Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read, 
And tongues to be your being shall rehearse 
When all the breathers of this world are dead ; 
You still shall live — such virtue hath my pen — 
Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of 
men. 

LXXXII, 

I grant thou wert not married to my Muse, 
And therefore mayst without attaint o'erlook 



96 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

The dedicated words which writers use 
Of their fair subject, blessing every book. 
Thou art as fair in knowledge as in hue, 
Finding thy worth a limit past my praise, 
And therefore art enforc'd to seek anew 
Some fresher stamp of the time-bettering days. 
And do so, love ; yet when they have devis'd 
What strained touches rhetoric can lend, 
Thou truly fair wert truly sympathiz'd 
In true plain words by thy true-telling friend ; 
And their gross painting might be better us'd 
Where cheeks need blood, in thee it is abus'd. 

LXXXIII. 

I never saw that you did painting need, 
And therefore to your fair no painting set ; 
I found, or thought I found, you did exceed 
The barren tender of a poet's debt ; 
And therefore have I slept in your report, 
That you yourself being extant well might show 
How far a modern quill doth come too short, 
Speaking of worth, what worth in you doth grow. 
This silence for my sin you did impute, 
Which shall be most my glory, being dumb ; 
For I impair not beauty being mute, 
When others would give life and bring a tomb. 
There lives more life in one of your fair eyes 
Than both your poets can in praise devise. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 97 

LXXXIV. 

Who is it that says most ? which can say more 
Than this rich praise, that you alone are you ? 
In whose confine immured is the store 
Which should example where your equal grew. 
Lean penury within that pen doth dwell 
That to his subject lends not some small glory ; 
But he that writes of you, if he can tell 
That you are you, so dignifies his story. 
Let him but copy what in you is writ, 
Not making worse what nature made so clear, 
And such a counterpart shall fame his wit, 
Making his style admired every where. 

You to your beauteous blessings add a curse, 
Being fond on praise, which makes your praises 
worse. 

LXXXV. 

My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still, 

W T hile comments of your praise, richly compil'd, 

Reserve their character with golden quill 

And precious phrase by all the Muses fil'd. 

I think good thoughts whilst other write good words, 

And, like unletter'd clerk, still cry ' Amen ' 

To every hymn that able spirit affords 

In polish'd form of well-refined pen. 

Hearing you prais'd, I say ' 'T is so, 't is true/ 

And to the most of praise add something more ; 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — J 



98 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

But that is in my thought, whose love to you, 
Though words come hindmost, holds his rank before. 
Then others for the breath of words respect, 
Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect. 

LXXXVI. 

Was it the proud full sail of his great verse, 
Bound for the prize of all too precious you, 
That did my ripe thoughts in my brain inhearse, 
Making their tomb the womb wherein they grew ? 
Was it his spirit, by spirits taught to write 
Above a mortal pitch, that struck me dead ? 
No, neither he, nor his compeers by night 
Giving him aid, my verse astonished. 
He, nor that affable familiar ghost 
Which nightly gulls him with intelligence, 
As victors of my silence cannot boast ; 
I was not sick of any fear from thence. 

But when your countenance fill'd up his line, 
Then lack'd I matter ; that enfeebled mine. 

LXXXVII. 

Farewell ! thou art too dear for my possessing, 
And like enough thou know'st thy estimate. 
The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing ; 
My bonds in thee are all determinate. 
For how do I hold thee but by thy granting ? 
And for that riches where is my deserving ? 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 99 

The cause of this fair gift in me is wanting, 
And so my patent back again is swerving. 
Thyself thou gav'st, thy own worth then not knowing, 
Or me, to whom thou gav'st it, else mistaking ; 
So thy great gift, upon misprision growing, 
Comes home again, on better judgment making. 
Thus have I had thee, as a dream doth flatter, 
In sleep a king, but waking no such matter. 

LXXXVIII. 

When thou shalt be dispos'd to set me Tight, 
And place my merit in the eye of scorn, 
Upon thy side against myself I '11 fight, 
And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn. 
With mine own weakness being best acquainted, 
Upon thy part I can set down a story 
Of faults conceal'd, wherein I am attainted, 
That thou in losing me shalt win much glory. 
And I by this will be a gainer too ; 
For, bending all my loving thoughts on thee, 
The injuries that to myself I do, 
Doing thee vantage, double-vantage me. 
Such is my love, to thee I so belong, 
That for thy right myself will bear all wrong. 

LXXXIX. 

Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault, 
And I will comment upon that offence ; 



ioo Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt, 
Against thy reasons making no defence. 
Thou canst not, love, disgrace me half so ill, 
To set a form upon desired change, 
As I '11 myself disgrace ; knowing thy will, 
I will acquaintance strangle and look strange, 
Be absent from thy walks, and in my tongue 
Thy sweet beloved name no more shall dwell, 
Lest I, too much profane, should do it wrong 
And haply of our old acquaintance tell. 
For thee against myself I '11 vow debate, 
For I must ne'er love him whom thou dost hate. 



XC. 

Then hate me when thou wilt, — if ever, now ; 

Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross, 

Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow, 

And do not drop in for an after-loss. 

Ah, do not, when my heart hath scap'd this sorrow, 

Come in the rearward of a conquer'd woe ; 

Give not a windy night a rainy morrow, 

To linger out a purpos'd overthrow. 

If thou wilt leave me, do not leave me last, 

When other petty griefs have done their spite, 

But in the onset come ; so shall I taste 

At first the very worst of fortune's might, 

And other strains of woe, which now seem woe, 
Compar'd with loss of thee will not seem so. 



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XCL 

Some glory in their birth, some in their skill, 
Some in their wealth, some in their bodies' force, 
Some in their garments, though new-fangled ill, 
Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse, 
And every humour hath his adjunct pleasure, 
Wherein it finds a joy above the rest ; 
But these particulars are not my measure, 
All these I better in one general best. 
Thy love is better than high birth to me, 
Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost. 
Of more delight than hawks or horses be, 
And, having thee, of all men's pride I boast ; 
Wretched in this alone, that thou mayst take 
All this away and me most wretched make. 

XCII. 

But do thy worst to steal thyself away, 
For term of life thou art assured mine, 
And life no longer than thy love will stay, 
For it depends upon that love of thine. 
Then need I not to fear the worst of wrongs, 
When in the least of them my life hath end. 
I see a better state to me belongs 
Than that which on thy humour doth depend ; 
Thou canst not vex me with inconstant mind, 
Since that my life on thy revolt doth lie. 



102 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

O, what a happy title do I find, 
Happy to have thy love, happy to die ! 

But what 's so blessed-fair that fears no blot ? 

Thou mayst be false, and yet I know it not. 

XCIII. 

So shall I live, supposing thou art true, 
Like a deceived husband ; so love's face 
May still seem love to me, though alter'd new, 
Thy looks with me, thy heart in other place ; 
For there can live no hatred in thine eye, 
Therefore in that I cannot know thy change. 
In many's looks the false heart's history 
Is writ in moods and frowns and wrinkles strange; 
But heaven in thy creation did decree 
That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell ; 
Whate'er thy thoughts or thy heart's workings be, 
Thy looks should nothing thence but sweetness tell. 
How like Eve's apple doth thy beauty grow, 
If thy sweet virtue answer not thy show ! 

XCIV. 

They that have power to hurt and will do none, 
That do not do the thing they most do show, 
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone, 
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow, 
They rightly do inherit heaven's graces 
And husband nature's riches from expense ; 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 103 

They are the lords and owners of their faces, 

Others but stewards of their excellence. 

The summer's flower is to the summer sweet, 

Though to itself it only live and die, 

But if that flower with base infection meet, 

The basest weed outbraves his dignity ; 

For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds, 
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds. 

xcv. 

How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame 
Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose, 
Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name ! 
O, in what sweets dost thou thy sins enclose ! 
That tongue that tells the story of thy days, 
Making lascivious comments on thy sport, 
Cannot dispraise but in a kind of praise ; 
Naming thy name blesses an ill report. 
O, what a mansion have those vices got 
Which for their habitation chose out thee, 
Where beauty's veil doth cover every blot, 
And all things turn to fair that eyes can see ! 

Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege ; 

The hardest knife ill-us'd doth lose his edge. 

XCVI. 

Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness ; 
Some say thy grace is youth and gentle sport. 



104 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Both grace and faults are lov'd of more and less ; 
Thou mak'st faults graces that to thee resort. 
As on the finger of a throned queen 
The basest jewel will be well esteem'd, 
So are those errors that in thee are seen 
To truths translated and for true things deem'd. 
How many lambs might the stern wolf betray, 
If like a lamb he could his looks translate ! 
How many gazers mightst thou lead away, 
If thou wouldst use the strength of all thy state ! 
But do not so ; I love thee in such sort 
As, thou being mine, mine is thy good report. 



XCVII. 

How like a winter hath my absence been 
From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year ! 
What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen, 
What old December's bareness every where ! 
And yet this time remov'd was summer's time, 
The teeming autumn, big with rich increase, 
Bearing the wanton burthen of the prime, 
Likewidow'd wombs after their lords' decease. 
Yet this abundant issue seem'd to me 
But hope of orphans and unfather'd fruit, 
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee, 
And, thou away, the very birds are mute ; 
Or, if they sing, 't is with so dull a cheer 
That leaves look pale, dreading the winter 's near. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 105 

XCVIII. 

From you have I been absent in the spring, 
When prcud-pied April dress'd in all his trim 
Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing, 
That heavy Saturn laugh'd and leap'd with him. 
Yet nor the lays of birds nor the sweet smell 
Of different flowers in odour and in hue 
Could make me any summer's story tell, 
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew. 
Nor did I wonder at the lily's white, 
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose ; 
They were but sweet, but figures of delight, 
Drawn after you, you pattern of all those. 
Yet seem'd it winter still, and, you away, 
As with your shadow I with these did play. 

XCIX. 

The forward violet thus did I chide : 

Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that 

smells, 
If not from my love's breath ? The purple pride 
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells 
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed. 
The lily I condemned for thy hand, 
And buds of marjoram had stolen thy hair ; 
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand, 
One blushing shame, another white despair ; 



106 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

A third, nor red nor white, had stolen of both, 
And to his robbery had annex'd thy breath, 
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth 
A vengeful canker eat him up to death. 
More flowers I noted, yet I none could see 
But sweet or colour it had stolen from thee. 



Where art thou, Muse, that thou forget'st so long 
To speak of that which gives thee all thy might ? 
Spend'st thou thy fury on some worthless song, 
Darkening thy power to lend base subjects light ? 
Return, forgetful Muse, and straight redeem 
In gentle numbers time so idly spent ; 
Sing to the ear that doth thy lays esteem 
And gives thy pen both skill and argument. 
Rise, resty Muse, my love's sweet face survey, 
If Time have any wrinkle graven there ; 
If any, be a satire to decay, 
And make Time's spoils despised every where. 

Give my love fame faster than Time wastes life ; 

So thou prevent'st his scythe and crooked knife. 



CI. 



O truant Muse, what shall be thy amends 
For thy neglect of truth in beauty dyed ? 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 107 

Both truth and beauty on my love depends ; 

So dost thou too, and therein dignified. 

Make answer, Muse : wilt thou not haply say 

' Truth needs no colour, with his colour fix'd ; 

Beauty no pencil, beauty's truth to lay ; 

But best is best, if never intermix'd ? ' 

Because he needs no praise, wilt thou be dumb ? 

Excuse not silence so ; for 't lies in thee 

To make him much outlive a gilded tomb, 

And to be prais'd of ages yet to be. 

Then do thy office, Muse ; I teach thee how 
To make him seem long hence as he shows now. 

CII. 

My love is strengthen'd, though more week in seeming ; 
I love not less, though less the show appear ; 
That love is mer.chandiz'd whose rich esteeming 
The owner's tongue doth publish every where. 
Our love was new and then but in the spring 
When I was wont to greet it with my lays, 
As Philomel in summer's front doth sing 
And stops her pipe in growth of riper days ; 
Not that the summer is less pleasant now 
Than when her mournful hymns did hush the night, 
But that wild music burthens every bough 
And sweets grown common lose their dear delight. 
Therefore like her I sometime hold my tongue, 
Because I would not dull you with my song. 



io8 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

cm. 

Alack, what poverty my muse brings forth, 
That, having such a scope to show her pride, 
The argument all bare is of more worth 
Than when it hath my added praise beside ! 
O, blame me not, if I no more can write ! 
Look in your glass, and there appears a face - 
That overgoes my blunt invention quite, 
Dulling my lines and doing me disgrace. 
Were it not sinful then, striving to mend, 
To mar the subject that before was well ? 
For to no other pass my verses tend 
Than of your graces and your gifts to tell ; 

And more, much more, than in my verse can sit 
Your own glass shows you when you look in it. 

CIV. 

To me, fair friend, you never can be old, 
For as you were when first your eye I eyed, 
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold 
Have from the forests shook three summers' pride, 
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn'd 
In process of the seasons have I seen, 
Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burn'd, 
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green. 
Ah ! yet doth beauty, like a dial-hand, 
Steal from his figure and no pace perceiv'd ; 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 109 

So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand, 
Hath motion and mine eye may be deceiv'd, 
For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred : 
Ere you were born was beauty's summer dead. 

CV. 

Let not my love be call'd idolatry, 

Nor my beloved as an idol show, 

Since all alike my songs and praises be 

To one, of one, still such, and ever so. 

Kind is my love to-day, to-morrow kind, 

Still constant in a wondrous excellence ; 

Therefore my verse to constancy confm'd, 

One thing expressing, leaves out difference. 

' Fair, kind, and true ' is all my argument, 

' Fair, kind, and true ' varying to other words ; 

And in this change is my invention spent, 

Three themes in one, which wondrous scope affords. 
1 Fair, kind, and true ' have often liv'd alone, 
Which three till now never kept seat in one. 

CVI. 

When in the chronicle of wasted time 
I see descriptions of the fairest wights, 
And beauty making beautiful old rhyme 
In praise of ladies dead and lovely knights, 
Then, in the blazon of sweet beauty's best, 
Of hand, of foot, of lip, of eye, of brow, 



no Shakespeare's Sonnets 

I see their antique pen would have express 'd 

Even such a beauty as you master now. 

So all their praises are but prophecies 

Of this our time, all you prefiguring ; 

And, for they look'd but with divining eyes, 

They had not skill enough your worth to sing, 
For we which now behold these present days 
Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to praise. 

CVII. 

Not mine own fears, nor the prophetic soul 
Of the wide world dreaming on things to come, 
Can yet the lease of my true love control, 
Suppos'd as forfeit to a confin'd doom. 
The mortal moon hath her eclipse endur'd, 
And the sad augurs mock their own presage ; 
Incertainties now crown themselves assur'd, 
And peace proclaims olives of endless age. 
Now with the drops of this most balmy time 
My love looks fresh, and Death to me subscribes, 
Since, spite of him, I '11 live in this poor rhyme, 
While he insults o'er dull and speechless tribes ; 
And thou in this shalt find thy monument, 
When tyrants' crests and tombs of brass are spent. 

CVIII. 

What 's in the brain that ink may character 
Which hath not figur'd to thee my true spirit ? 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 1 1 i 

What 's new to speak, what new to register, 

That may express my love or thy dear merit ? 

Nothing, sweet boy ; but yet, like prayers divine, 

I must each day say o'er the very same, 

Counting no old thing old, thou mine, I thine, 

Even as when first I hallow'd thy fair name. 

So that eternal love in love's fresh case 

Weighs not the dust and injury of age, 

Nor gives to necessary wrinkles place, 

But makes antiquity for aye his page, 

Finding the first conceit of love there bred 
Where time and outward form would show it dead. 



CIX. 

O, never say that I was false of heart, 
Though absence seem'd my flame to qualify. 
As easy might I from myself depart 
As from my soul, which in thy breast doth lie. 
That is my home of love ; if I have rang'd, 
Like him that travels I return again, 
Just to the time, not with the time exchang'd, 
So that myself bring water for my stain. 
Never believe, though in my nature reign 'd 
All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood, 
That it could so preposterously be stain'd 
To leave for nothing all thy sum of good ; 
For nothing this wide universe I call, 
Save thou, my rose ; in it thou art my all. 



H2 Shakespeare's Sonnets 



CX. 

Alas, 't is true I have gone here and there 

And made myself a motley to the view, 

Gor'd mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, 

Made old offences of affections new ; 

Most true it is that I have look'd on truth 

Askance and strangely, but, by all above, 

These blenches gave my heart another youth, 

And worse essays prov'd thee my best of love. 

Now all is done, have what shall have no end ; 

Mine appetite I never more will grind 

On newer proof, to try an older friend, 

A god in love, to whom I am confin'd. 

Then give me welcome, next my heaven the best, 
Even to thy pure and most most loving breast. 

CXI. 

O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, 

The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, 

That did not better for my life provide 

Than public means which public manners breeds. 

Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, 

And almost thence my nature is subdued 

To what it works in, like the dyer's hand. 

Pity me then and wish I were renew'd, 

Whilst, like a willing patient, I will drink 

Potions of eisel 'gainst my strong infection ; 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 113 

No bitterness that I will bitter think, 
Nor double penance, to correct correction. 
Pity me then, dear friend, and I assure ye 
Even that your pity is enough to cure me. 

CXII. 

Your love and pity doth the impression fill 
Which vulgar scandal stamp'd upon my brow ; 
For what care I who calls me well or ill, 
So you o'er-green my bad, my good allow ? 
You are my all the world, and I must strive 
To know my shames and praises from your tongue ; 
None else to me, nor I to none alive, 
That my steel'd sense or changes right or wrong. 
In so profound abysm I throw all care 
Of others' voices that my adder's sense 
To critic and to flatterer stopped are. 
Mark how with my neglect I do dispense : 
You are so strongly in my purpose bred 
That all the world besides methinks are dead. 

CXIII. 

Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind, 

And that which governs me to go about 

Doth part his function and is partly blind, 

Seems seeing, but effectually is out ; 

For it no form delivers to the heart 

Of bird, of flower, or shape, which it doth latch. 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 8 



ii4 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Of his quick objects hath the mind no part, 
Nor his own vision holds what it doth catch ; 
For if it see the rud'st or gentlest sight, 
The most sweet favour or deformed 'st creature, 
The mountain or the sea, the day or night, 
The crow or dove, it shapes them to your feature. 
Incapable of more, replete with you, 
My most true mind thus makes mine eye untrue. 

CXIV. 

Or whether doth my mind, being crown'd with you, 
Drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery ? 
Or whether shall I say, mine eye saith true, 
And that your love taught it this alchemy, 
To make of monsters and things indigest 
Such cherubins as your sweet self resemble, 
Creating every bad a perfect best, 
As fast as objects to his beams assemble ? 
O, 't is the first ; 't is flattery in my seeing, 
And my great mind most kingly drinks it up. 
Mine eye well knows what with his gust is greeing, 
And to his palate doth prepare the cup ; 
If it be poison'd, 't is the lesser sin 
That mine eye loves it and doth first begin. 

CXV. 

Those lines that I before have writ do lie, 

Even those that said I could not love you dearer ; 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 1 1 5 

Yet then my judgment knew no reason why 
My most full flame should afterwards burn clearer. 
But, reckoning time, whose million'd accidents 
Creep in 'twixt vows and change decrees of kings, 
Tan sacred beauty, blunt the sharp'st intents, 
Divert strong minds to the course of altering things, 
Alas, why, fearing of time's tyranny, 
Might I not then say ' Now I love you best,' 
When I was certain o'er incertainty, 
Crowning the present, doubting of the rest ? 
Love is a babe ; then might I not say so, 
To give full growth to that which still doth grow ? 

CXVI. 

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 

Admit impediments. Love is not love 

Which alters when it alteration finds, 

Or bends with the remover to remove. 

O, no ! it is an ever-fixed mark 

That looks on tempests and is never shaken ; 

It is the star to every wandering bark, 

Whose worth 's unknown, although his height be taken. 

Love 's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 

Within his bending sickle's compass come ; 

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 

But bears it out even to the edge of doom. 

If this be error and upon me prov'd, 

I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd. 



1 1 6 Shakespeare's Sonnets 



CXVII. 

Accuse me thus : that I have scanted all 
Wherein I should your great deserts repay, 
Forgot upon your dearest love to call, 
Whereto all bonds do tie me day by day ; 
That I have frequent been with unknown minds 
And given to time your own dear-purchas'd right ; 
That I have hoisted sail to all the winds 
Which should transport me farthest from your sight. 
Book both my wilfulness and errors down, 
And on just proof surmise accumulate ; 
Bring me within the level of your frown, 
But shoot not at me in your waken 'd hate ; 
Since my appeal says I did strive to prove 
The constancy and virtue of your love. 

CXVIII. 

Like as, to make our appetites more keen, 

With eager compounds we our palate urge, 

As, to prevent our maladies unseen, 

We sicken to shun sickness when we purge, 

Even so, being full of your ne'er-cloying sweetness, 

To bitter sauces did I frame my feeding, 

And, sick of welfare, found a kind of meetness 

To be diseas'd ere that there was true needing. 

Thus policy in love, to anticipate 

The ills that were not, grew to faults assur'd 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 117 

And brought to medicine a healthful state 
Which, rank of goodness, would by ill be cur'd ; 
But thence I learn, and find the lesson true, 
Drugs poison him that so fell sick of you. 

CXIX. 

What potions have I drunk of Siren tears, 
Distill'd from limbecks foul as hell within, 
Applying fears to hopes and hopes to fears, 
Still losing when I saw myself to win ! 
What wretched errors hath my heart committed, 
Whilst it hath thought itself so blessed never ! 
How have mine eyes out of their spheres been fitted 
In the distraction of this madding fever ! 
O benefit of ill ! now I find true 
That better is by evil still made better ; 
And ruin'd love, when it is built anew, 
Grows fairer than at first, more strong, far greater. 
So I return rebuk'd to my content, 
And gain by ill thrice more than I have spent. 

cxx. 

That you were once unkind befriends me now, 
And for that sorrow which I then did feel 
Needs must I under my transgression bow, 
Unless my nerves were brass or hammer'd steel. 
For if you were by my unkindness shaken 
As I by yours, you 've pass'd a hell of time, 



1 1 8 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

And I, a tyrant, have no leisure taken 
To weigh how once I suffer'd in your crime. 
O, that our night of woe might have remember'd 
My deepest sense how hard true sorrow hits, 
And soon to you, as you to me, then tender'd 
The humble salve which wounded bosoms fits ! 

But that your trespass now becomes a fee ; 

Mine ransoms yours, and yours must ransom me. 

CXXI. 

'T is better to be vile than vile esteem'd, 
When not to be receives reproach of being, 
And the just pleasure lost which is so deem'd 
Not by our feeling but by others' seeing ; 
For why should others' false adulterate eyes 
Give salutation to my sportive blood ? 
Or on my frailties why are frailer spies, 
Which in their wills count bad what I think good ? 
No, I am that I am, and they that level 
At my abuses reckon up their own. 
I may be straight, though they themselves be bevel ; 
By their rank thoughts my deeds must not be shown, 
Unless this general evil they maintain, 
All men are bad, and in their badness reign. 

CXXII. 

Thy gift, thy tables, are within my brain 
Full character'd with lasting memory, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 1 1 

Which shall above that idle rank remain 

Beyond all date, even to eternity, 

Or, at the least, so long as brain and heart 

Have faculty by nature to subsist ; 

Till each to raz'd oblivion yield his part 

Of thee, thy record never can be miss'd. 

That poor retention could not so much hold, 

Nor need I tallies thy dear love to score ; 

Therefore to give them from me was I bold, 

To trust those tables that receive thee more. 

To keep an adjunct to remember thee 

Were to import forgetfulness in me. 

CXXIII. 

No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change ! 
Thy pyramids built up with newer might 
To me are nothing novel, nothing strange ; 
They are but dressings of a former sight. 
Our dates are brief, and therefore we admire 
What thou dost foist upon us that is old, 
And rather make them born to our desire 
Than think that we before have heard them told. 
Thy registers and thee I both defy, 
Not wondering at the present nor the past, 
For thy records and what we see doth lie, 
Made more or less by thy continual haste. 
This I do vow and this shall ever be : 
I will be true, despite thy scythe and thee. 



120 Shakespeare's Sonnets 



CXXIV. 

If my dear love were but the child of state, 
It might for Fortune's bastard be unfather'd, 
As subject to Time's love or to Time's hate, 
Weeds among weeds, or flowers with flowers gather'd. 
No, it was builded far from accident ; 
It suffers not in smiling pomp, nor falls 
Under the blow of thralled discontent, 
Whereto the inviting time our fashion calls. 
It fears not policy, that heretic, 
Which works on leases of short-number'd hours, 
But all alone stands hugely politic, 
That it nor grows with heat nor drowns with showers. 
To this I witness call the fools of time, 
Which die for goodness, who have liv'd for crime. 

CXXV. 

Were 't aught to me I bore the canopy, 

With my extern the outward honouring, 

Or laid great bases for eternity, 

Which prove more short than waste or ruining ? 

Have I not seen dwellers on form and favour 

Lose all, and more, by paying too much rent, 

For compound sweet foregoing simple savour, 

Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent ? 

No, let me be obsequious in thy heart, 

And take thou my oblation, poor but free, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 121 

Which is not mix'd with seconds, knows no art, 

But mutual render, only me for thee. 

Hence, thou suborn'd informer ! a true soul 
When most impeach 'd stands least in thy control. 

CXXVI. 

O thou, my lovely boy, who in thy power 
Dost hold Time's fickle glass his fickle hour, 
Who hast by waning grown and therein show'st 
Thy lovers withering as thy sweet self grow'st, 
If Nature, sovereign mistress over wrack, 
As thou goest onwards, still will pluck thee back, 
She keeps thee to this purpose, that her skill 
May time disgrace and wretched minutes kill. 
Yet fear her, O thou minion of her pleasure ! 
She may detain, but not still keep, her treasure ; 
Her audit, though delay'd, answer'd must be, 
And her quietus is to render thee. 



CXXVII. 



In the old age black was not counted fair, 
Or, if it were, it bore not beauty's name, 
But now is black beauty's successive heir, 
And beauty slander'd with a bastard shame ; 
For since each hand hath put on nature's power, 
Fairing the foul with art's false borrow'd face, 
Sweet beauty hath no name, no holy bower, 



122 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

But is prof an 'd, if not lives in disgrace. 
Therefore my mistress' brows are raven black, 
Her eyes so suited, and they mourners seem 
At such who, not born fair, no beauty lack, 
Slandering creation with a false esteem ; 
Yet so they mourn, becoming of their woe, 
That every tongue says beauty should look so. 

CXXVIII. 

How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st, 
Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds 
With thy sweet fingers, when thou gently sway'st 
The wiry concord that mine ear confounds, 
Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap 
To kiss the tender inward of thy hand, 
Whilst my poor lips, which should that harvest reap, 
At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand ! 
To be so tickled, they would change their state 
And situation with those dancing chips 
O'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait, 
Making dead wood more blest than living lips. 
Since saucy jacks so happy are in this, 
Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss. 

CXXIX. 

The expense of spirit in a waste of shame 
Is lust in action ; and till action lust 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 123 

Is perjur'd, murtherous, bloody, full of blame, 

Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust, 

Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight, 

Past reason hunted, and no sooner had 

Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait 

On purpose laid to make the taker mad ; 

Mad in pursuit and in possession so ; 

Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme ; 

A bliss in proof and, prov'd, a very woe ; 

Before, a joy propos'd ; behind, a dream. 

All this the world well knows ; yet none knows well 
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell. 



cxxx. 

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun ; 

Coral is far more red than her lips' red ; 

If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun ; 

If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. 

I have seen roses damask'd, red and white, 

But no such roses see I in her cheeks ; 

And in some perfumes is there more delight 

Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. 

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know 

That music hath a far more pleasing sound ; 

I grant I never saw a goddess go ; 

My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground 
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare 
As any she belied with false compare ! 



124 Shakespeare's Sonnets 



CXXXI. 

Thou art as tyrannous, so as thou art, 
As those whose beauties proudly make them cruel ; 
For well thou know'st to my dear doting heart 
Thou art the fairest and most precious jewel. 
Yet, in good faith, some say that thee behold 
Thy face hath not the power to make love groan ; 
To say they err I dare not be so bold, 
Although I swear it to myself alone. 
And, to be sure that is not false I swear, 
A thousand groans, but thinking on thy face, 
One on another's neck, do witness bear 
Thy black is fairest in my judgment's place. 
In nothing art thou black save in thy deeds, 
And thence this slander, as I think, proceeds. 

CXXXII. 

Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me, 
Knowing thy heart torments me with disdain, 
Have put on black and loving mourners be, 
Looking with pretty ruth upon my pain ; 
And truly not the morning sun of heaven 
Better becomes the grey cheeks of the east, 
Nor that full star that ushers in the even 
Doth half that glory to the sober west, 
As those two mourning eyes become thy face. 
O, let it then as well beseem thy heart 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 125 

To mourn for me, since mourning doth thee grace, 

And suit thy pity like in every part ! 

Then will I swear beauty herself is black, 
And all they foul that thy complexion lack. 

CXXXIII. 

Beshrew that heart that makes my heart to groan 
For that deep wound it gives my friend and me ! 
Is 't not enough to torture me alone, 
But slave to slavery my sweet'st friend must be ? 
Me from myself thy cruel eye hath taken, 
And my next self thou harder hast engross'd. 
Of him, myself, and thee, I am forsaken ; 
A torment thrice threefold thus to be cross'd. 
Prison my heart in thy steel bosom's ward, 
But then my friend's heart let my poor heart bail ; 
Whoe'er keeps me, let my heart be his guard ; 
Thou canst not then use rigour in my gaol. 
And yet thou wilt, for I, being pent in thee, 
Perforce am thine, and all that is in me. 

CXXXIV. 

So, now I have confess'd that he is thine, 
And I myself am mortgag'd to thy will, 
Myself I '11 forfeit, so that other mine 
Thou wilt restore, to be my comfort still. 
But thou wilt not, nor he will not be free. 
For thou art covetous and he is kind ; 



126 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

He learn 'd but surety-like to write for me 
Under that bond that him as fast doth bind. 
The statute of thy beauty thou wilt take, 
Thou usurer, that putt'st forth all to use, 
And sue a friend came debtor for my sake ; 
So him I lose through my unkind abuse. 

Him have I lost, thou hast both him and me ; 

He pays the whole, and yet am I not free. 

cxxxv. 

Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy ' Will,' 
And ' Will ' to boot, and ' Will ' in overplus ; 
More than enough am I that vex thee still, 
To thy sweet will making addition thus. 
Wilt thou, whose will is large and spacious, 
Not once vouchsafe to hide my will in thine ? 
Shall will in others seem right gracious, 
And in my will no fair acceptance shine ? 
The sea, all water, yet receives rain still 
And in abundance addeth to his store ; 
So thou, being rich in ' Will,' add to thy ' Will ' 
One will of mine, to make thy large ' Will ' more. 

Let no unkind, no fair beseechers kill ; 

Think all but one, and me in that one ' Will.' 

CXXXVI. 

If thy soul check thee that I come so near, 
3 wear to thy blind soul that I was thy ' Will,' 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 127 

And will, thy soul knows, is admitted there ; 

Thus far for love my love-suit, sweet, fulfil. 

' Will ' will fulfil the treasure of thy love, 

Ay, fill it full with wills, and my will one. 

In things of great receipt with ease we prove 

Among a number one is reckon'd none. 

Then in the number let me pass untold, 

Though in thy store's account I one must be ; 

For nothing hold me, so it please thee hold 

That nothing me, a something sweet to thee. 
Make but my name thy love, and love that still, 
And then thou lov'st me, for my name is ' Will.' 

CXXXVII. 

Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes, 

That they behold, and see not what they see ? 

They know what beauty is, see where it lies, 

Yet what the best is take the worst to be. 

If eyes corrupt by over-partial looks 

Be anchor'd in the bay where all men ride, 

Why of eyes' falsehood hast thou forged hooks 

Whereto the judgment of my heart is tied ? 

Why should my heart think that a several plot 

Which my heart knows the wide world's common place ? 

Or mine eyes, seeing this, say this is not, 

To put fair truth upon so foul a face ? 

In things right true my heart and eyes have err'd, 
And to this false plague are they now transferr'd. 



128 Shakespeare's Sonnets 



CXXXVIII. 

When my love swears that she is made of truth, 
I do believe her, though I know she lies, 
That she might think me some untutor'd youth, 
Unlearned in the world's false subtleties. 
Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young, 
Although she knows my days are past the best, 
Simply I credit her false-speaking tongue ; 
On both sides thus is simple truth suppress'd. 
But wherefore says she not she is unjust ? 
And wherefore say not I that I am old ? 
O, love's best habit is in seeming trust, 
And age in love loves not to have years told. 
Therefore I lie with her and she with me, 
And in our faults by lies we flatter'd t>e. 

CXXXIX. 

O, call not me to justify the wrong 

That thy un kindness lays upon my heart ! 

Wound me not with thine eye, but with thy tongue ; 

Use power with power, and slay me not by art. 

Tell me thou lov'st elsewhere, but in my sight, 

Dear heart, forbear to glance thine eye aside ; 

What need'st thou wound with cunning when thy might 

Is more than my o'er-press'd defence can bide ? 

Let me excuse thee : ah ! my love well knows 

Her pretty looks have been mine enemies, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 129 

And therefore from my face she turns my foes, 
That they elsewhere might dart their injuries. 
Yet do not so, but since I am near slain 
Kill me outright with looks and rid my pain. 

CXL. 

Be wise as thou art cruel ; do not press 
My tongue-tied patience with too much disdain, 
Lest sorrow lend me words, and words express 
The manner of my pity-wanting pain. 
If I might teach thee wit, better it were, 
Though not to love, yet, love, to tell me so, 
As testy sick men, when their deaths be near, 
No news but health from their physicians know ; 
For if I should despair, I should grow mad, 
And in my madness might speak ill of thee. 
Now this ill-wresting world is grown so bad, 
Mad slanderers by mad ears believed be. 

That I may not be so, nor thou belied, 

Bear thine eyes straight, though thy proud heart go 
wide. 

CXLI. 

In faith, I do not love thee with mine eyes, 

For they in thee a thousand errors note, 

But 't is my heart that loves what they despise, 

Who in despite of view is pleas'd to dote ; 

Nor are mine ears with thy tongue's tune delighted, 

Nor tender feeling, to base touches prone, 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 9 



130 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

Nor taste, nor smell, desire to be invited 
To any sensual feast with thee alone. 
But my five wits nor my five senses can 
Dissuade one foolish heart from serving thee, 
Who leaves unsway'd the likeness of a man, 
Thy proud heart's slave and vassal wretch to be. 
Only my plague thus far I count my gain, 
That she that makes me sin awards me pain. 

CXLII. 

Love is my sin and thy dear virtue hate, 
Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving. 
O, but with mine compare thou thine own state, 
And thou shalt find it merits not reproving ! 
Or, if it do, not from those lips of thine, 
That have prof an 'dr their scarlet ornaments 
And seaPd false bonds of love as oft as mine, 
Robb'd others' beds' revenues of their rents. 
Be it lawful I love thee, as thou lov'st those 
Whom thine eyes woo as mine importune thee ; 
Root pity in thy heart, that when it grows 
Thy pity may deserve to pitied be. 

If thou dost seek to have what thou dost hide, 
By self-example mayst thou be denied ! 

CXLIII. 

Lo ! as a careful housewife runs to catch 
One of her feather'd creatures broke away, 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 131 

Sets down her babe and makes all swift dispatch 
In pursuit of the thing she would have stay, 
Whilst her neglected child holds her in chase, 
Cries to catch her whose busy care is bent 
To follow that which flies before her face, 
Not prizing her poor infant's discontent ; 
So runn'st thou after that which flies from thee, 
Whilst I thy babe chase thee afar behind. 
But if thou catch thy hope, turn back to me, 
And play the mother's part, kiss me, be kind ; 
So will I pray that thou mayst have thy ' Will,' 
If thou turn back, and my loud crying still. 

CXLIV. 

Two loves I have of comfort and despair, 

Which like two spirits do suggest me still ; 

The better angel is a man right fair, 

The worser spirit a woman colour'd ill. 

To win me soon to hell, my female evil 

Tempteth my better angel from my side, 

And would corrupt my saint to be a devil, 

Wooing his purity with her foul pride. 

And whether that my angel be turn'd fiend 

Suspect I may, yet not directly tell, 

But being both from me, both to each friend, 

I guess one angel in another's hell ; 

Yet this shall I ne'er know, but live in doubt, 
Till my bad angel fire my good one out. 



132 Shakespeare's Sonnets 



CXLV. 

Those lips that Love's own hand did make 
Breath 'd forth the sound that said ' I hate ' 
To me that languish 'd for her sake ; 
But when she saw my woeful state, 
Straight in her heart did mercy come, 
Chiding that tongue that ever sweet 
Was us'd in giving gentle doom, 
And taught it thus anew to greet. 
' I hate ' she alter'd with an end 
That follow'd it as gentle day 
Doth follow night, who like a fiend 
From heaven to hell is flown away ; 
' I hate ' from hate away she threw, 
And sav'd my life, saying ' not you.' 

CXLVI. 

Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, 
Press'd by these rebel powers that thee array, 
Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth, 
Painting thy outward walls so costly gay ? 
Why so large cost, having so short a lease, 
Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend ? 
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, 
Eat up thy charge ? is this thy body's end ? 
Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss, 
And let that pine to aggravate thy store ; 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 133 

Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross ; 

Within be fed, without be rich no more. 

So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds on men, 
And Death once dead, there 's no more dying then. 

CXLVII. 

My love is as a fever, longing still 

For that which longer nurseth the disease, 

Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, 

The uncertain sickly appetite to please. 

My reason, the physician to my love, 

Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, 

Hath left me, and I desperate now approve 

Desire is death, which physic did except. 

Past cure I am, now reason is past care, 

And frantic-mad with evermore unrest ; 

My thoughts and my discourse as madmen's are, 

At random from the truth vainly express 'd ; 

For I have sworn thee fair and thought thee bright 
Who art as black as hell, as dark as night. 

CXLVIII. 

O me, what eyes hath Love put in my head, 
Which have no correspondence with true sight ! 
Or, if they have, where is my judgment fled, 
That censures falsely what they see aright ? 
If that be fair whereon my false eyes dote, 
What means the world to say it is not so ? 



1 34 Shakespeare's Sonnets 

If it be not, then love doth well denote 
Love's eye is not so true as all men's no< 
How can it ? O, how can Love's eye be true 
That is so vex'd with watching and with tears ? 
No marvel then though I mistake my view ; 
The sun itself sees not till heaven clears. 

O cunning Love ! with tears thou keep'st me blind. 

Lest eyes well-seeing thy foul faults should find. 

CXLIX. 

Canst thou, O cruel ! say I love thee not, 
When I against myself with thee partake ? 
Do I not think on thee when I forgot 
Am of myself, all tyrant, for thy sake ? 
Who hateth thee that I do call my friend ? 
On whom frown 'st thou that I do fawn upon ? 
Nay, if thou lower'st on me, do I not spend 
Revenge upon myself with present moan ? 
What merit do I in myself respect, 
That is so proud thy service to despise, 
When all my best doth worship thy defect, 
Commanded by the motion of thine eyes ? 

But, love, hate on, for now I know thy mind ; 

Those that can see thou lov'st, and I am blind. 

CL. 

O, from what power hast thou this powerful might 
W 7 ith insufficiency my heart to sway ? 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 135 

To make me give the lie to my true sight, 
.'And swear that brightness doth not grace the day ? 
Whence hast thou this becoming of things ill, 
That in the very refuse of thy deeds 
There is such strength and warrantise of skill 
That, in my mind, thy worst all best exceeds ? 
Who taught thee how to make me love thee more 
The more I hear and see just cause of hate ? 
O, though I love what others do abhor, 
With others thou shouldst not abhor my state ! 

If thy unworthiness rais'd love in me, 

More worthy I to be belov'd of thee. 

CLI. 

Love is too young to know what conscience is ; 
Yet who knows not conscience is born of love ? 
Then, gentle cheater, urge not my amiss, 
Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove ; 
For, thou betraying me, I do betray 
My nobler part to my gross body's treason. 
My soul doth tell my body that he may 
Triumph in love ; flesh stays no farther reason, 
But, rising at thy name, doth point out thee 
As his triumphant prize. Proud of this pride, 
He is contented thy poor drudge to be, 
To stand in thy affairs, fall by thy side. 
No want of conscience hold it that I call 
Her ' love ' for whose dear love I rise and fall. 



136 Shakespeare's Sonnets 



CLII. 

In loving thee thou know'st I am forsworn. 
But thou art twice forsworn, to me love swearing, 
In act thy bed- vow broke and new faith torn 
In vowing new hate after new love bearing. 
But why of two oaths' breach do I accuse thee, 
When I break twenty ? I am perjur'd most, 
For all my vows are oaths but to misuse thee, 
And all my honest faith in thee is lost ; 
For I have sworn deep oaths of thy deep kindness, 
Oaths of thy love, thy truth, thy constancy, 
And, to enlighten thee, gave eyes to blindness, 
Or made them swear against the thing they see ; 
For I have sworn thee fair — more perjur'd I, 
To swear against the truth so foul a lie ! 



CLIII. 

Cupid laid by his brand, and fell asleep ; 
A maid of Dian's this advantage found, 
And his love-kindling fire did quickly steep 
In a cold valley-fountain of that ground, 
Which borrow 'd from this holy fire of Love 
A dateless lively heat, still to endure, 
And grew a seething bath, which yet men prove 
Against strange maladies a sovereign cure. 



Shakespeare's Sonnets 137 

But at my mistress' eye Love's brand new-fir'd, 
The boy for trial needs would touch my breast ; 
I, sick withal, the help of bath desir'd, 
And thither hied, a sad distemper'd guest, 
But found no cure ; the bath for my help lies 
Where Cupid got new fire — my mistress' eyes. 

CLIV. 

The little Love-god lying once asleep 

Laid by his side his heart-inflaming brand, 

Whilst many nymphs that vow'd chaste life to keep 

Came tripping by ; but in her maiden hand 

The fairest votary took up that fire 

Which many legions of true hearts had warm'd, 

And so the general of hot desire 

Was sleeping by a virgin hand disarm 'd. 

This brand she quenched in a cool well by, 

Which from Love's fire took heat perpetual, 

Growing a bath and healthful remedy 

For men diseas'd ; but I, my mistress' thrall, 

Came there for cure, and this by that I prove, — 
Love's fire heats water, water cools not love. 



NOTES 



The references to " PalgraVe " in the Notes are to F. T. Pal- 
grave's edition of Shakespeare^' Songs and Sonnets (London, 1879) ; 
those to " Verity " are to Mr. A. . W. Verity's notes on the Sonnets in 
the "Henry Irving" edition of , Shakespeare ; and those to " Her- 
ford " are to Prof. C. H. Herford'sf "Eversley" edition of Shake- 
speare. For the editions of Gildon, Sewell, and Lintott, which are 
occasionally quoted on textual variations, see pp. 10, 1 1 above. The 
references to " Walker " are' to William Sidney Walker's Critical 
Examination of the Text #f, Shakespeare's Plays (London, i860). 
For those to Dowden, Tyler, and Wyndham, see the Preface. 
Those to the " standard " editors of Shakespeare (M alone, Steevens, 
Johnson, Knight, Dyce, Grant, White, Hudson, and others) need 
no explanation. 



140 



w? '-Mm 




Sonnet CLIV 
NOTES 



The Metre. — The metre of the Sonnets is the regular ten- 
syllable iambic form used in the plays, except in 145, where it is 
octosyllabic. The rhymes do not follow the Italian (or " Petrar- 
chan ") model, but are arranged in four quatrains with an added 

141 



142 Notes 

couplet. This arrangement, which some assume to have been 
taken from Daniel, appears to have been due to Surrey, being found 
in some of his sonnets printed in TotteVs Miscellany, and written 
many years earlier than the publication of that anthology in 1557. 
The Dedication. — The only begetter. Boswell remarks : "The 
begetter is merely the person who gets or procures a thing. So in 
Dekker's Satiromastix : ' I have some cousin-germans at court shall 
beget you the reversion of the master of the king's revels.' W. H. 
was probably one of the friends to whom Shakespeare's ' sugred 
sonnets,' as they are termed by Meres, had been communicated, and 
who furnished the printer with copy." See, however, p. 20 above. 
White says : " This dedication is not written in the common phrase- 
ology of its period ; it is throughout a piece of affectation and elabo- 
rate quaintness, in which the then antiquated prefix be- might be 
expected to occur ; beget being used for get, as Wiclif uses betook 
for took in Mark, xv. 1 : ' And ledden him and betoken him to 
Pilate.' " 



As Boswell and Boaden note, this and the following sonnets are 
only an expansion of V. and A. 169-174 : "Upon the earth's in- 
crease why shouldst thou feed," etc. 

"Herr Krauss {Shakespeare-Jahrbuch, 1881) cites, as a parallel 
to the arguments in favour of marriage in these sonnets, the versified 
dialogue between Geron and Histor at the close of Sidney's Arca- 
dia, lib. iii" (Dowden). 

2. Rose. In the quarto the word is printed in italics and with a 
capital. See on 20. 7 below. 

5. Contracted. Betrothed ; as often in the plays. Cf. T. N. v. 
1. 268, M.for M. v. I. 330, etc. Tyler explains it as meaning, " Not 
having given extension to thyself by offspring." 

6. Self-substantial fuel. " Fuel of the substance of the flame 
itself" (Dowden). "You feed your sight on the sight of your- 
self" (Wyndham) f 



Notes 143 



7. Where abundance lies. "That is, potentially " (Tyler). 

10. Gaudy. Gay and showy ; with no disparaging sense. Cf. 
L. L. L. v. 2. 812 : "Nip not the gaudy blossoms of your love." 

12. Mak' 'st waste hi niggarding. Cf. R. and J. i. 1. 223 : — 
" Benvolio. Then she hath sworn that she will still live chaste ? 

Romeo. She hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste." 

13. Pity the world, etc. "Pity the world, or else be a glutton, 
devouring the world's due, by means of the grave (which will else 
swallow your beauty — cf. Sonn. 77. 6) and of yourself, who re- 
fuse to beget offspring" (Dowden). Steevens conjectured "be thy 
grave and thee " = " be at once thyself and thy grave." 

14. The world's due. The perpetuation of the friend's beauty. 
If he has no children, the grave will consume not only his own 
body but his hope of posterity. 

II 

1. Forty. Schmidt puts this passage among those in which forty 
is used for "an indefinite number" (as often); but the context 
shows that it has distinct reference to age. Cf. p. 41 above. 

4. Tatter' 'd. The quarto (the ed. of 1609) has "totter'd," as in 
26. 1 1 below. The early eds. have tottered ( = tattered) in several 
other places ; as Rich. II. iii. 3. 52, 1 Hen. IV. iv. 2. 37, and K.John, 
v. 5. 7 {tottering). Weed (= garment) occurs often in S. 

7. Within thine ozvn deep sunken eyes. Only in your aged self. 

8. Thriftless. Unprofitable ; as in T. N. ii. 2. 40 : " What 
thriftless sighs shall poor Olivia breathe ! " 

11. Shall sum my count, etc. Shall square my account, and be 
my excuse when I am old. Wyndham thinks that make my old 
excuse is " obscure," but it does not seem so to me. 

Ill 

W. M. Rossetti {lives of Famotis Poets, 1877), who accepts the 
"personal" theory, is inclined to identify the youth to whom this 



144 Notes 

sonnet is addressed rather with Pembroke than Southampton, be- 
cause the former was very like his mother. 

5. Unear'd. Unploughed ; used by S. only here ; but ear 
(=till, plough) occurs in A. W. i. 3. 47, Rich. II. iii. 2. 212, A. 
and C. i. 2. 115, i. 4. 49, and V. and A. (dedication). For the fig- 
ure, cf. A. and C. ii. 2. 233 : " He plough'd her, and she cropp'd." 
Steevens quotes M. for M. i. 4. 43. White aptly remarks that the 
expression is " the converse of the common metaphor ' virgin soil.' " 

7. Fond. Foolish ; the usual meaning in S. For the passage, 
Malone compares V. and A. 757-761. 

9. Thy mother 's glass, etc. Cf. R. of L. 1758, where Lucretius 

says : — 

" Poor broken glass, I often did behold 
In thy sweet semblance my old age new born." 

10. April. This indicates that the friend is in the springtime of 
life. Minto says that lines 9, 10 suit the Countess of Pembroke. 

11. Windows of thine age. Malone quotes L. C. 14 : "Some 
beauty peep'd through lattice of sear'd age." 

13. But if, etc. But if you mean to be forgotten in time to 
come, etc. 

Live. Capell conjectures " love." 

IV 

3. Nature's bequest, etc. Dowden quotes M. for M. i. 1. 36 : — 
" Spirits are not finely touch'd 
But to fine issues, nor Nature never lends 
The'smallest scruple of her excellence 
But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines 
Herself the glory of a creditor, 
Both thanks and use." 
Steevens compares Milton, Comus, 679 : — 

" Why should you be so cruel to yourself, 
And to those dainty limbs which Nature lent 
For gentle usage, and soft delicacy ? 



Notes 145 



But you invert the covenants of her trust, 

And harshly deal, like an ill borrower, 

With that which you receiv'd on other terms." 

See also Id. 720-727. 

4. Free. Liberal, bountiful. Cf. T. and C. iv. 5. 100 : " His 
heart and hand both open and both free," etc. 

8. Live. Subsist. By traffic with thyself alone it is impossible 
to get a living. The miser, who hoards his money instead of put- 
ting it out at interest, is a profitless usurer. 

10. Thou of thyself, etc. You cheat yourself of continued ex- 
istence. 

12. Audit. Printed in italics and with a capital in the quarto. 
See on I. 2 above. Acceptable (note the accent) is used by S. no- 
where else. Acceptable audit = satisfactory settlement of your debt 
to Nature. 

14. The executor. Malone reads "thy executor" (the conjec- 
ture of Capell). 



" In Sonn. 5 and 6, youth and age are compared to the seasons 
of the year ; in 7, they are compared to morning and evening, the 
seasons of the day" (Dowden). 

1. Hours. A dissyllable ; as often. Cf. Temp. iii. I. 91, v. I. 4, 
etc. Here the quarto has"howers." 

2. Gaze. Object gazed at ; as in Macb. v. 8. 24 : " Live to be 
the show and gaze o' the time." 

3. The tyrants. The merciless destroyers. 

4. And that unfair, etc. " And render that which was once 
beautiful no longer fair" (Malone). Unfair is the only instance 
of the verb (or the word) in S. Cf. fairing in 127. 6 below. 

6. Confounds. Destroys. Cf. 8. 7, 60. 8, 64. 10, and 69. 7. 

8. Bareness. Cf. 97. 4 below. 

9. Distillation. Perfumes distilled from flowers. Cf. Sonn. 54 
and M. N. D. i. 1. 76 : " Earthlier happy is the rose distill'd," etc. 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — IO 



146 Notes 



See also 119. 2, Hen. V. iv. 1. 5, T. and C. i. 3. 350, etc. The 
figure is a favourite one with S. 

11. Bereft. Taken away, lost. Cf. C. of E. ii. 1. 40 : "to see 
like right bereft," etc. Beauty's effect — the perfume which per- 
petuates the memory of the beauty of the rose. 

14. Leese. Lose. Dowden notes that the word occurs in I Kings, 
xviii. 5, in the ed. of 161 1 {lose in modern eds.). S. has it only 
here. It occurs often in Chaucer. 

VI 

" This sonnet carries on the thoughts of 4 and 5 — the distilling 
of perfumes from the former, and the interest paid on money from 
the latter " (Dowden). 

I. Ragged. Rugged, rough. Cf. A. Y. L. ii. 5. 15, etc. 

5. Use. Interest. Cf. V. and A. 768 : " But gold that 's put to 
use more gold begets ; " and see also 134. 10 below. 

6. Happies. Makes happy ; the only instance of the verb in S. 
13. SelfwilVd. Delius conjectures " self-kill'd." 

VII 

5. Steep-up. The word occurs also in P. P. 1 21 (probably not 
Shakespeare's). Steep-doivn he uses only in Oth. v. 2. 280. 

7. Yet mortal looks adore, etc. Malone quotes R. and J. i. 1. 125 : 

" Madam, an hour before the worshipp'd sun 
Peer'd forth the golden window of the east." 

10. Reeleth. Dowden quotes R. and J. ii. 3. 3 : — 

" And flecked darkness like a drunkard reels 
From forth day's path." 
Cf. Rich. III. v. 3. 29 : "The weary sun" (at setting). 

11. Fore. So in the quarto, as regularly in the early eds. ; 
"Tore" in the modern eds. Converted— turned away ; as in 11. 
4 below. On the passage, Dowden compares T. of A. i. 2. 150 : 
" Men shut their doors against a setting sun." 



Notes 147 



12. Tract. Track ; as in T. of A. i. 1. 50 : "leaving no track 
behind." 

13. Out-going in thy noon. Not referring to death, as outgoing 
might seem at first to suggest, but to the " decline of life," as we 
say, which is compared to the decline of the sun after reaching the 
meridian. 

VIII 

I. Music to hear. Thou, to hear whom is music. Malone 
thought S. might have written "Music to ear" = "Thou whose 
every accent is music to the ear." For the personal use, cf. Sonn. 
128. I : "thou, my music." 

5-14. For the figurative allusion to musical harmony, cf. R. 
of L. 1 131 fol. 

7. Confounds. Dost waste or destroy. See on 5. 6 above. 

9-12. Mark how one string, etc. This comparison of musical 
harmony to a happy family singing together is one of the most 
beautiful of Shakespeare's many beautiful references to music — 
and to domestic happiness as well. It is a figure that " works both 
ways." For the figure in married, cf. 82. 1, T. and C. i. 3. 100, 
R. and J. i. 3. 83, etc. 

14. Wilt prove none. Perhaps, as Dowden suggests, an allusion 
to the proverbial expression that " one is no number." Cf. 136. 
8 : "Among a number one is reckon'd none." The meaning 
seems to be that, " since many make but one, one will prove also 
less than itself, that is, will prove none." Wyndham quotes Mar- 
lowe, Hero and Leander : — 

" One is no number ; maids are nothing, then, 
Without the sweet society of men." 

IX 

4. Make/ess. Without a make, or mate ; used by S. only here. 
For make, cf. Spenser, F. Q. iii. 11. 2 : "That was as trew in love 
as Turtle to her make ; " Id. iv. 2. 30 : " And each not farre be- 



148 Notes 

hinde him had his make," etc. In Ben Jonson's New Inn, the 
Host forms a hieroglyphic to express the proverb, " A heavy purse 
makes a light heart," which he interprets thus : — 

" There 't is exprest ! first, by a purse of gold, 
A heavy purse, and then two turtles, makes, 
A heart with a light stuck in 't, a light heart." 

7. Private. Opposed to the idea of general implied in the 
world above. 

9. Untkrift. Prodigal; as in 13. 13 below. In Rich. II. ii. 3. 
122, the only other instance of the noun in S., it is = good-for- 
nothing. 

10. His. Its ; referring to what. 

12. The user. The one having the use of it, the possessor. 

X 

1. For shame, etc. For very shame, etc. Many eds. print 
" For shame ! " The meaning is the same, but the rhythm is 
marred. 

6. Stick 1 st. Dost hesitate or scruple ; always followed by an 
infinitive. Cf. Hen. VIII. ii. 2. 127, Cor. ii. 3. 17, Ham. iv. 5. 
93, etc. ♦ 

7. Ruinate, etc. Cf. R. of L. 944 : " To ruinate proud build- 
ings," etc. The meaning is, " seeking to bring to ruin that house 
(that is, family) which it ought to be your chief care to repair." 
Dowden adds : "These lines confirm the conjecture that the 
father of Shakspere's friend was dead." Cf. 13. 9-14 below. 
Dowden elsewhere refers to this as an objection to the Herbert 
theory, as Herbert's father lived until 1601, while Southampton's 
father died when his son was a boy. But " you had a father," etc., 
in Sonn. 13 clearly means, "As you had a father, become a father 
yourself." For the figure, cf. also 3 Hen. VI. v. 1. 83 and T. G. of 
V. v. 4. 9. 

9. Thy thought. Thy purpose of not marrying. 



Notes 149 



XI 

1. As fast as thou shalt zvane, etc. This has been called "ob- 
scure," but it is so only at first sight. The meaning is : If you have 
children, as fast as you grow old you renew in your offspring (in 
one of thine) the youth you have lost ; thus, as it were, growing 
afresh from that (youth) which thou departest from. The omission 
of a preposition is common in a relative clause if it occurs in the 
antecedent clause. Possibly departest may be transitive, as in 2 
Hen. IV. iv. 5. 91 : " Depart the chamber," etc. 

4. Convertest. Dost turn away. Cf. 7. 11 above and 14. 12 
below. Note the rhyme with departest, and see also 14. 12, 17. 2, 
49. 10, and 72. 6 below. 

7. The times. "The generations of men" (Dowden). 

9. For store. "To be preserved for wj^" (Malone). Schmidt 
makes store = " increase of men, fertility, population." 

11. Look, whom she best endow' 'd, etc. To whom she gave much 
she gave more ; that is, the power of procreation. Cf. Matthew, 
xiii. 12: " For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall 
have more abundantly." Some editors read, " gave thee more ; " 
making zvhom she best endow'd = " however liberal she may have 
been to others" (Malone). 

14. Not let that copy die. Cf. T. N. i. 5. 261 : 

" Lady, you are the cruell'st she alive, 
If you will lead these graces to the grave 
And leave the world no copy." 

XII 

2. Brave. Beautiful. Cf. 15. 8 below. See also //am. ii. 2. 312 : 
"this brave o'erhanging firmament," etc. For hideous night, cf. 5. 
6: "hideous winter." 

3. Violet past prime. Dowden compares Ha?n. i. 3. 7 : "A 
violet in the youth of primy nature." 



1 50 Notes 



4. Sable curls all silver 'a 7 . The quarto has " or siluer'd ; " cor- 
rected by Malone. The Cambridge ed. notes an anonymous con- 
jecture, " o'er-silvered with white." Steevens compares Hani. i. 2. 

242 : — 

" It was, as I have seen it in his life, 
A sable silver'd ; " 

referring to the Ghost's beard. 

6. Canopy. For the verb, cf. T. N. i. 1. 41, Cymb. ii. 2. 21, etc. 

8. Beard. Cf. M. N. D. ii. 1. 95 : — 

" the green corn 
Hath rotted ere his youth attain'd a beard." 

9. Question make. Consider. Elsewhere it is = doubt ; as in 
M. of V.\. 1. 156, 184, L. C. 321, etc. 

10. The wastes of Time. The things destroyed by Time. 

11. Do themselves forsake. In dying they forsake their former 
loveliness. 

14. Save breed, etc. " Except children, whose youth may set 
the scythe of Time at defiance, and render thy own death less 
painful" (Malone). 

XIII 

" Note you and your instead of thy, thine, and the address my 
love for the first time" (Dowden). Elsewhere Dowden remarks: 
"In the first fifty sonnets, you is of extremely rare occurrence, in 
the second fifty you and thou alternate in little groups of sonnets, 
thou having still a preponderance, but now only a slight preponder- 
ance ; in the remaining twenty-six, you becomes the ordinary mode 
of address, and tFou the exception. In the sonnets to a mistress, 
thou is invariably employed. A few sonnets of the first series, as 
63-68, have " my love," and the third person throughout. Thou 
and you are to be considered only when addressing friend or lover, 
not Time, the Muse, etc. Five sets of sonnets may then be distin- 
guished : 1. Using thou. 2. Using you. 3. Using neither, but be- 



Notes 



J 5i 



longing to a thou group. 4. Using neither, but belonging to a you 
group. 5. Using both (24)." In his larger ed. Dowden adds a 
tabular classification of the Sonnets under these five heads. 
1. Yourself! That is, master of yourself ; as the context shows. 

5. Beauty zvhich you hold in lease. Malone compares Daniel's 
Delia, 47 : — 

" in beauty's lease expir'd appears 
The date of age, the calends of our death." 

6. Determination. End ; the legal sense. On the passage, cf. 
V. and A. 171 fol. 

9. So fair a house. The word house here seems to refer to the 
ancestral house, or family ; not, like the "beauteous roof" of 10. 
7, to the bodily mansion. 

10. Husbandry. Economy, thrift. Cf. Macb. ii. 1. 4, Ham. i. 
3. 77, etc. 

13. Unthrifts ! See on 9. 9 above. 

14. You had a father. Dowden compares A. IV. i. 1. 19 : 
"This young gentlewoman had a father — O, that 'had !' how 
sad a passage 't is ! " See on 10. 7 above. 

XIV 

1, 2. Dowden quotes Sidney, Arcadia, book iii. : " O sweet 
Philoclea, . . . thy heavenly face is my astronomy" (that is, as- 
trology, as here) ; and Astrophel and Stella (ed. 1591), Sonn. 26 : — 
"Though dusty wits dare scorn astrology 



[I] oft forejudge my after-following race 
By only those two stars in Stella's face." 

So Daniel, Delia, 30 (on Delia's eyes) : — 

" Stars are they sure, whose motions rule desires ; 
And calm and tempest follow their aspects." 

6. Pointing. Pointing out, appointing. Cf. T. ofS.m. 1. 19, 
iii. 2. 1, 15, etc. See also Bacon, Essay 45 (ed. of 1625): "But 



152 Notes 

this to be, if you doe not point, any of the lower Roomes, for a 
Dining Place of Servants ; " and Essay 58 : " Pointing Dayes for 
Pitched Fields," etc. His — its ; as in 9. 10 above. 

8. Oft predict. Frequent prediction or prognostication ; the 
only instance of predict as a noun in S. Sewell reads " ought pre- 
dict " (= anything predicted). 

9. From thine eyes, etc. Cf. L. L. L. iv. 3. 350 : " From women's 
eyes this doctrine I derive," etc. 

10. Art. Knowledge. 

1 1- 14. Dowden puts Truth . . . convert and Thy end . . . date 
in quotation marks, explaining read such art as = " gather by read- 
ing such truths of science as the following." 

12. Store. See on 11. 9 above. Malone paraphrases thus : "If 
thou wouldst change thy single state, and beget a numerous prog- 
eny." 

Convert here rhymes with art, as in Daniel's Delia, II, with 
heart (Dowden). See on 11. 4 above, and cf. R. of L. 592. 



XV 

3. Stage. Malone reads " state ; " but, as Dowden notes, the 
theatrical words presenteih and shows confirm the old text. It is 
one of the poet's many allusions to life as a stage. Cf. A. Y. L. ii. 
7. 139 fob, M. of V. i. 2. 77, etc. 

7. Vaunt. Exult, glory. 

9. Conceit. Conception, imagination ; as in 108. 13 below, and 
often. 

1 1. Debateth. Combats, contends. Malone quotes A. W. i. 2. 

" nature and sickness 
Debate it at their leisure." 

Schmidt may be right in putting the present passage under debate 
— discuss. 



Notes 153 



XVI 

4. With means trior e blessed, etc. That is, better than the com- 
memoration in verse referred to in the close of the preceding 
sonnet. 

5. The top of happy hours. The prime of joyous youth. 

6. Maiden gardens yet unset. Malone compares L. C. 171 : 
"Heard where his plants in others' orchards grew." See also 3. 
5, 6 above. 

7. Bear your living Jlowers. Some would change your to 
"you ;" but your living flozvers is antithetical to "your painted 
counterfeit" 

8. Much liker, etc. Much more like you than your painted por- 
trait is. For counterfeit, cf. M. of V. iii. 2. 115: "fair Portia's 
counterfeit," etc. 

9. Lines of life. Probably = " living pictures, that is, children " 
(an anonymous explanation in the Variorum of 1821). Dowden 
remarks: "The unusual expression is selected because it suits the 
imagery of the sonnet, lines applying to (1) lineage, (2) delinea- 
tion with a pencil, a portrait, (3) lines of verse, as in 18. 12. Lines 
of life are living lines, living poems and pictures, children." Wynd- 
ham adds a fourth allusion from palmistry — the "line of life" in 
M. of V. ii. 2. 146. Hudson reads "line of life," which he makes 
== " living line, or lineage." 

10. This time's pencil. This may be = any painter of the time. 
Massey supposes that some particular artist is referred to, perhaps 
Mirevelt, who painted the Earl of Southampton's portrait. The 
quarto reads "this (Times pensel or my pupill pen)," etc., and 
the modern eds. generally read " this, Time's pencil," etc. Dowden 
asks : " Are we to understand the line as meaning ' Which this 
pencil of Time or this my pupil pen ; ' and is Time here conceived 
as a limner who has painted the youth so fair, but whose work can- 
not last for future generations? In 19 'Devouring Time ' is trans- 
formed into a scribe ; may not ' tyrant Time ' be transformed here 



154 Notes 



into a painter? In 20 it is Nature who paints the face of the beau- 
tiful youth. This masterpiece of twenty years can endure neither as 
painted by Time's pencil, nor as represented by Shakspere's unskil- 
ful, pupil pen. Is the painted counterfeit Shakspere's portrayal in 
his verse? Cf. 53. 5." Wyndham makes Time's pencil mean 
" history, record at large ; " and my pupil pen — "my humbler art." 
11. Fair. Beauty. Cf. 18. 7, 68. 3, and 83. 2 below. 

XVII 

1. Who will believe, etc. "In 16 Shakspere has said that his 
- pupil pen ' cannot make his friend live to future ages. He now car- 
ries on this thought ; his verse, although not showing half his friend's 
excellencies, will not be believed in times to come " (Dowden). 

2. Deserts? For the rhyme with parts, see on 14. 12 above. 
Cf. 72. 6 below. 

11. PoeVs rage. Poetical extravagance. Schmidt regards it as 
contemptuous for "poetical inspiration." 

12. Stretched metre. Exaggerated verse. Keats took this line 
for the motto of his Endymion. 

14. You should live twice. Both your child and my verse would 
preserve your memory. 

XVIII 

" Shakspere takes heart, expects immortality for his verse, and so 
immortality for his friend as surviving in it " (Dowden). 

3. Rough winds do shake, etc. Malone quotes Cymb. i. 3. 36 : — 

"And, like the tyrannous breathing of the north, 
Shakes all our buds from growing; " 

and T. of S. v. 2. 140: "as whirlwinds shake fair buds." 

5. Eye of heaven. Cf. Rich. IT. iii. 2. 37 : " the searching eye 

of heaven ; " and R. of L. 356: "The eye of heaven is out." 

7. Fair. Beauty. See on 16. 11 above. So in 10 below, fair 

thou owest= beauty thou possessest. For owe, cf. 70. 14 below. 



Notes 155 



8. Unlrimm 1 d. Despoiled of its charms. 

12. To ti?ne thou grow est. Thy fame will increase with the lapse 
of time. 

14. So long lives this. This anticipation of immortality for their 
works was a common conceit with the poets of the time. Cf. 
Spenser, Amoretti, 27, 69, 95 ; Drayton, Idea, 6, 44 ; Daniel, Delia, 
39, etc. 

XIX 

The thought in the last line of 18 is continued and expanded 
in this sonnet. 

1. Devouring. Walker conjectures "Destroying;" but devour 
is often = destroy in S. Cf., Rich. II., i. 3. 284 : " Devouring pes- 
tilence," etc. 

4. Phanix. For allusions to the phoenix in S., cf. Temp. iii. 3. 
23, A. Y. L. iv. 3. 17, Hen. VIII. v. 5. 41, T. of A. ii. 1. 32, etc. 
See also the poem of The Phoenix and the Turtle. 

5. Fleets. The quarto has "fleet'st; " but the analogy of 8. 7 
("confounds") favours Dyce's emendation, which is also adopted 
by Dowden. This contraction of the second person singular of 
verbs ending in -/ occurs often in S. in the early eds., though often 
" emended " in the modern ones. See Abbott's Grammar, § 340. 

10. Antique. Accented on the first syllable, as regularly in S. 

XX 

"His friend is 'beauty's pattern' (19. 12) ; as such he owns the 
attributes of male and female beauty" (Dowden). 

Palgrave omits this sonnet, with 151, 153, and 154. 

I. With Nature's own hand painted. Not artificially coloured — 
a fashion which S. detested, as he did false hair. Cf. Sonn. 68. 5 
below, and M. of V. iii. 2. 94 : — 

" the dowry of a second head, 
The skull that bred them [the " golden locks "] in the sepulchre." 



i 5 6 



Notes 



See also T. of A. iv. 3. 144 : " Thatch your poor thin roofs With 
burdens of the dead." In L. L. L. iv. 3. 258 Biron says : — 

" O, if in black my lady's brows be deck'd, 
It mourns that painting and usurping hair 
Should ravish doters with a false aspect." 

It was then comparatively a recent fashion. Stow says : " Women's 
periwigs were first brought into England about the time of the mas- 
sacre of Paris" (1572). Barnaby Rich, in 1615, says of the periwig- 
sellers : " These attire-makers within these forty years were not 
known by that name. . . . But now they are not ashamed to set 
them forth upon their stalls — such monstrous mop-poles of hair — 
so proportioned and deformed that but within these twenty or thirty 
years would have drawn the passers-by to stand and gaze, and to 
wonder at them." 

2. Master-mistress of my passion. "Who sways my love with 
united charms of man and woman" (Dowden). 

5. Less false in rolling. Dowden compares Spenser, F. Q. iii. 

I. 41 : — 

" Her wanton eyes (ill signes of womanhed) 
Did roll too lightly." 

Tyler refers to 139. 6 and 140. 14 below. 

7. Hues. Printed in the quarto in italics and with a capital. 
This led Tyrwhitt to surmise that "Mr. W. H." might be Mr. 
William Hews, or Hughes. But the following words are all printed 
in the same manner: Rose, I. 2; Audit, 4. 12; Statues, 55. 5; 
Intrim, 56. 9 ; Alien, 78. 3; Satire, 100. 11 ; Autmnne, 104. 5; 
Abisme, 112. 9f—Adcumie, 114. 4; Syren, 119. 1 ; Hereticke, 124. 
9; Informer, 125. 13 ; Audite, 126. 13 ; and Quietus, 126. 14. The 
word hue was used by Elizabethan writers not only in the sense of 
complexion, but also in that of shape, form. In Spenser, F. Q. v. 9. 
17, Talus tries to seize Malengin, who transforms himself into a 
fox, a bush, a bird, a stone, and then a hedgehog : — 

" Then gan it [the hedgehog] run away incontinent, 
Being returned to his former hew." 



Notes 157 



The meaning here may then be, A man in shape surpassing all 
that excite the wonder and admiration of men and women. 

11. Defeated. Disappointed, defrauded. Cf. M. N. D. iv. I. 
161: — 

" They would have stolen away ; they would, Demetrius, 
Thereby to have defeated you and me, 
You of your wife, and me of my consent." 

13. Prich'd. Marked. Cf. /. C. iii. 1. 216, etc. ; and for the 
equivoque, cf. 2 Hen. IV. iii. 2. 122. 



XXI 

1. So is it not, etc. "The face of Shakspere's friend is painted 
by Nature alone, and so too there is no false painting, no poetical 
hyperbole, in the description." For the extravagancies and exag- 
gerations of the sonnet writers of the time, Dowden refers to Main 
{Treasury of English Sonnets), who cites Spenser's Amoretti, 9 
and 64 ; Daniel's Delia, 19 ; Barnes's Parthenophil and Partheno- 
phe, Sonn. 48. Compare also Griffin's Fidessa, Sonn. 39 ; and Con- 
stable's Diana (1594), the 6th decade, Sonn. 1. Sonn. 130 is in the 
same vein as this. Wyndham regards this sonnet as " the first attack 
on the false art of a rival poet." For Shakespeare's aversion to 
paint in women, cf. I. L. L. iv. 3. 259, 263, M. for M. iii. 2. 83, T. 
of A. iv. 3. 147, etc. 

5. Couplement. Union, combination. The quarto has " coople- 
ment." Gildon reads " complement," and Sewell (2d ed.) " com- 
pliment." For compare as a noun, cf. 35. 6 and 130. 14 below. 

8. Rondure. Circle. Cf. roundure in K.John, ii. 1. 259. 

12. Gold candles. Cf. M. of V.v. 1. 220: "these blessed can- 
dles of the night ; " R. and J. iii. 5.9: " Night's candles are burnt 
out ; " and Macb. ii. 1. 5 : — 

" There's husbandry in heaven ; 
Their candles are all out." 

13. That like of hearsay well. Apparently referring to the com- 



158 Notes 



monplace style of which he has been speaking. Schmidt makes it 
= " that fall in love with what has been praised by others ; " and 
Dowden " that like to be buzzed about by talk." For like of, cf. 
L. L. I. i. 1. 107, iv. 3. 158, Much Ado, v. 4. 59, etc. 
14. I will not praise, etc. Cf. L. L. L. iv. 3. 239 : — 

" Fie, painted rhetoric ! O, she needs it not; 
To things of sale a seller's praise belongs." 

See also 102. 3 below. 

XXII 

"The praise of his friend's beauty suggests by contrast Shak- 
spere's own face marred by time. He comforts himself by claiming 
his friend's beauty as his own" (Dowden). For the references to 
the poet's age in the Sonnets, see p. 41 above. 

3. Furrows. Cf. Sonn. 2 above, and Rich. III. i. 3. 229. 

4. Expiate. Bring to an end. Cf. Rich. III. iii. 3. 23 : " Make 
haste ; the hour of death is expiate." Here, as there, Steevens 
conjectures " expirate," which White and Hudson adopt. Surely 
there is no need of coining a word to replace one which S. twice 
uses and which can be plausibly explained. Malone quotes Chap- 
man's Byron's Conspiracie, in which an old courtier speaks of him- 
self as " A poor and expiate humour of the court." 

XXIII 

1. Unperfect. Used by S. only here ; but unperfectness occurs 
in Oth. ii. 3. 298. Imperfect we find in Sonn. 43. 11 and elsewhere, 
and imperfection six times in the plays. On the present passage, 
cf. Cor. v. 3. 40 : — 

" Like a dull actor now, 
I have forgot my part, and I am out, 
Even to a full disgrace." 

2. Besides. For the prepositional use, cf. T, N, iv. 2, 92 : " Alas, 
sir, how fell you besides your five wits? " 



Notes 159 



3. Replete with too much rage. The rage overcoming self-control. 

5. For fear of trust. Fearing to trust myself. Schmidt makes it 
= " doubting of being trusted ; " but the context clearly confirms 
the explanation I have given. Dowden calls attention to the con- 
struction of the first eight lines, 5, 6 referring to 1, 2, and 7, 8, to 

3,4- 

6. Ceremony. Hudson says that the word "is here used as a 
trisyllable, as if spelt ceremony ; " but how he would scan the verse 
I cannot imagine. The word is clearly a quadrisyllable, as almost 
always in S. 

9. Books. Sewell reads " looks ; " but the old reading is sup- 
ported by 13 below. The books, as Dowden remarks, are probably 
the manuscript books in which the poet writes his sonnets. 

12. That tongue. Probably = any tongue, however eloquent, 
rather than that of some particular person. 

XXIV 

1. StelVd. Fixed. Cf. Battle of Bothwell Bridge (Scott's Border 
Minstrelsy} : "They stell'd their cannons on the height." See also 
R. of L. 1444 and Lear, iii. 7. 61. Here the quarto has " steeld ; " 
corrected by Dyce (the conjecture of Capell). Some take " steeld " 
to be = written with a steel point, or stylus. 

2. Table. The tablet or surface on which a picture is painted. 
Cf. A. IV. i. 1. 106 and K.John, ii. 1. 503. 

3. The frame. That is, of the picture. 

4. Perspective. The word in S. means elsewhere either a kind 
of picture which was so painted as to be distinct only when viewed 
obliquely, or a kind of glass employed to produce optical illusions. 
Cf. Rich. IT. ii. 2. 18, A. W. v. 3. 48, and T. N. v. 1. 224. Here 
the meaning seems to be that the poet's eye (the painter) is that 
through which the person addressed must look to see his image, or 
picture, hanging in the bosoni's shop, or heart, within. The accent 
of perspective in S. is always on the first syllable. 



160 Notes 

Dowden remarks: "The strange conceits in this sonnet are par- 
alleled in Constable's Diana (1594), Sonn. 5 (p. 4, ed. Hazlitt) : — 
' Thine eye, the glasse where I behold my heart, 
Mine eye, the window through the which thine eye 
May see my heart, and there thyselfe espy 
In bloody colours how thou painted art.' 

■Compare also Watson's Teares of Fancie (1593), Sonn. 45, 46 (ed. 
Arber, p. 201) : — 

' My Mistres seeing her faire counterfet 
So sweetelie framed in my bleeding brest 



But it so fast was fixed to my heart,' " etc. 
II. Where through. Cf. where-against in Cor. iv. 5. 113, where- 
out in T. and C. iv. 5. 245, where-until in L. L. L. v. 2. 493, etc. 
13. Cunning. Art, skill ; as very often. 

XXV 

" In this sonnet S. makes his first complaint against Fortune, 
against his low condition. He is about to undertake a journey on 
some needful business of his own (26, 27), and rejoices to think 
that at least in one place he has a fixed abode, in his friend's heart " 
(Dowden). 

Prof. Hales (Cornhill Mag. Jan. 1877) suggests that the journeys 
spoken of in the Sonnets may have been from London to Stratford. 

4. Unloofrd for. " Not sought out, not ' distinguished ; ' as a 
favourite was said to be ' distinguished ' by a look or word from his 
sovereign " ( Wyndham) . 

5. Great princes' favourites, etc. Cf. Much Ado, iii. 1.8: — 

" Where honeysuckles, ripen'd by the sun, 
Forbid the sun to enter, like favourites 
Made proud by princes," etc. 
Hales thinks that Essex or Raleigh may have furnished the sugges- 
tion of the simile. 



Notes i6i 

6. The marigold. The "garden marigold" {Calendula offici- 
nalis}, of which Ellacombe says: "It was always a great favourite 
in our forefathers' gardens, and it is hard to give any reason why 
it should not be so in ours. Yet it has been almost completely 
banished, but may often be found in the gardens of cottages and 
old farmhouses, where it is still prized for its bright and almost 
everlasting flowers (looking very like a Gazanid) and evergreen 
tuft of leaves, while the careful housewife still picks and carefully 
stores the petals of the flowers, and uses them in broths and soups, 
believing them to be of great efficacy, as Gerarde said they were, 
'to strengthen and comfort the heart.' The two properties of the 
marigold — that it was always in flower, and that it turned its 
flowers to the sun and followed his guidance in their opening and 
shutting — made it a very favourite flower with the poets and em- 
blem writers. ... It was the ' heliotrope ' or ' solsequium ' or ' turne- 
sol ' of our forefathers, and is often alluded to under those names." 

Of the contemporary allusions to the flower, the following from 
Withers is a good example : — 

" When with a serious musing I behold 
The grateful and obsequious Marigold, 
How duly every morning she displays 
Her open breast when Phoebus spreads his rays ; 
How she observes him in his daily walk, 
Still bending towards him her small, slender stalk ; 
How when he down declines she droops and mourns, 
Bedewed, as 't were, with tears till he returns ; 
And how she veils her flowers when he is gone ; — 
When this I meditate, methinks the flowers 
Have spirits far more generous than ours, 
And give us fair examples to despise 
The servile fawnings and idolatries 
Wherewith we court these earthly things below, 
Which merit not the service we bestow." 

9. Painful — laborious, toilsome ; as in Temp. iii. 1. 1, T. of S. 
v. 2. 149, etc. 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — II 



1 62 Notes 

9. For fight. The quarto reads " for worth ; " corrected by 
Malone at the suggestion of Theobald, who also proposed forth for 
the rhyming word in 1 1 if worth was retained. White adopts the 
latter reading. Capell proposed " for might ; " and Steevens sug- 
gested this delectable emendation : — 

" The painful warrior for worth famoused, 
After a thousand victories once foil'd, 
Is from the book of honour quite razed," etc. 

XXVI 

Drake (Shakspeare and His Times, vol. ii. p. 63) notes that 
the language of the Dedication to the Rape of Lucrece, and that of 
part of the present sonnet are almost precisely the same. The 
Dedication runs thus : " The love I dedicate to your Lordship is 
without end. . . . The warrant I have of your honourable disposi- 
tion, not the worth of my untutored lines, makes it assured of ac- 
ceptance. What I have is yours, what I have to do is yours ; 
being part of all I have devoted yours. Were my worth greater, my 
duty would show greater." Capell had already noted the parallel. 

2. My duty strongly knit. Steevens quotes Macb. hi. I. 15. 

7. Some good conceit. Some happy idea. See on 15. 9 above, 
and cf. 108. 13 below. Bestow it = give it a place, treasure it up. 
Cf. C. of E. i. 2. 78, M. of V. ii. 2. 179, etc. 

9. Star. For the astrological allusion, cf. 14. 1 and 25. 1 above. 

10. Aspect. Accented on the last syllable, as regularly in S. 

11. Tatter 'd. The quarto has " tottered." See on 2. 4 above. 

12. Respect. Regard, consideration. The quarto has "their" 
for thy, as in 27. 10 below. 

XXVII 

Evidently written on a journey. 

3. Head. Dowden omits the comma after this word, thinking 
that the construction may be "a journey in my head begins to 
work my mind." 

4 



Notes 163 



4. To work my mind. That is, to set it to work. 

6. Intend. Here Schmidt makes the word = " bend, direct ; " 
as in M. W. ii. 1. 188, 1 Hen. IV. iv. 1. 92, A. and C. v. 2. 201, 
etc. 

7. Drooping. Drowsy, ready to close. 

9. Imaginary. Imaginative. Cf. K. John, iv. 2. 265 : "foul 
imaginary eyes of blood" (that is, the sanguinary eyes of my im- 
agination), etc. 

10. Shadow. Image ; as often. Cf. 37. 10, 43. 5, 53. 2, 61. 4, 
98. 14, etc. 

11. Like a jewel, etc. Cf. R. and J. i. 5. 47 : — 

" It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night 
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's ear." 

13. By day my limbs, etc. By day my limbs find no quiet for 
myself, that is, on account of my travel ; by night my mind finds 
no quiet for thee, that is, thinking of thee. For the interlaced or 
"chiastic" construction (a favourite one with S.), cf. W. T. iii. 2. 

164:- 

" though I with death and with 
Reward did threaten and encourage him." 

Cf. also 75. 11, 12 below. 

XXVIII 

A continuation of the preceding sonnet. 

5. Either' s. The quarto has " ethers," the ed. of 1 640 " others." 
9. To please him, etc. Most eds. put a comma after him. On 

the whole I prefer to omit it, as the Cambridge ed. does. 

11. Swart-complexion' d. First hyphened by Gildon. For swart 
(= dark, black), cf. C. of E. iii. 2. 104, K. John, iii. I. 46, etc. 

12. Twire. Peep, twinkle ; used by S. only here. Boswell 
quotes Jon son, Sad Shepherd, ii. 1 : " Which maids will twire at, 
'tween their fingers thus." Nares adds Beaumont and Fletcher, 
Women Pleased, iv. I ; " I saw the wench that twir'd and twinkled 



164 Notes < 

at thee ; " and Marston, Antonio and Mellida, act iv. : " I saw a 
thing stir under a hedge, and I peeped, and I spied a thing, and I 
peered and I tweered underneath." Gildon reads " tweer out." 
For giWst the quarto has "guil'st ; " corrected by Sewell. 

14. Strength. The quarto has " length ; " corrected by Dyce 
(the conjecture of Capell). Dowden, who retains the old text 
(though with some hesitation), explains it thus : "Each day's 
journey draws out my sorrows to a greater length ; but this process 
of drawing-out does not weaken my sorrows, for my night-thoughts 
come to make my sorrows as strong as before, nay stronger." 
Capell suggested "draw my sorrows stronger . . . length seem 
longer." 

XXIX 

2. Beweep. Cf. Rich. III. i. 3. 328, i. 4. 251, ii. 2. 49, etc. 

6. Like him, like him. The pronoun refers to different persons, 
like this man and that man below. 

7. Art. Literary skill. 

8. With what I most enjoy contented least. "The preceding 
line makes it not improbable that S. is here speaking of his own 
poems" (Dowden). 

12. Sings hymns at heaverts gate. Malone quotes Cymb. ii. 3. 
21 : " Hark, hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings ; " and Reed 
adds Lyly, Campaspe, v. I (referring to the lark) : — 

" How at heaven's gate she claps her wings, 
The morn not waking till she sings." 

Milton may have remembered S. (as not unfrequently elsewhere) 
when he wrote {P. L. v. 198) : — 

" ye birds, 
That singing up to heaven-gate ascend," etc. 

State is the subject of sins, not lark, as some make it by their 
pointing. 



Notes 165 



xxx 

I. Sessions of sweet silent thought. For the legal use of sessions 
(indicated by summons), cf. Oth. iii. 3. 138 : — 

" who has a breast so pure 
But some uncleanly apprehensions 
Keep leets and law-days and in session sit 
With meditations lawful ? " 

4. My dear time's waste. Those dear to me now gone. 

6. Dateless. Endless ; the only sense in S. Cf. 153. 6 below ; 
and see also Rich. II. i. 3. 151 and R. and J. v. 3. 115. 

8. Moan the expense. Lament the loss. Dowden thinks it 
means " pay my account of moans for," being explained by what 
follows (" tell o'er," etc.) ; but I cannot agree with him. For 
expense, cf. 94. 6 and 129. 1 below. 

10. Tell. Count ; as in 138. 12 below. In this line and the 
next, note the lingering sadness of the long o's. Cf. the effect of 
the long monosyllables in 4 above. 

XXXI 

1-4. All the friends I have lost live again in you. 

5. Obsequious. Funereal. Cf. Ham. i. 2. 92. 

6. Dear religious love. " In A Lover's Complaint, the beautiful 
youth pleads to his love that all earlier hearts which had paid 
homage to him now yield themselves through him to her service 
(a thought similar to that of this sonnet) ; one of these fair ad- 
mirers was a nun, a sister sanctified, but (250) : * Religious love 
put out Religion's eye''" (Dowden). Walker would read "dear- 
religious," which he explains as " making a religion of its 
affections." 

7. Interest. Right, claim. Cf. R. of L. 1798: "my sorrow's 
interest," etc. 

8. Thee. The quarto has "there ; " corrected by Gildon. 

II. Parts of me. Shares in me, claims upon me. 



1 66 Notes 



XXXII 

1. Well-contented. The meaning is obscure. Possibly it refers 
to the love of his friend which (as the preceding sonnet declares) 
has made up for all the losses he has suffered. 

4. Lover. For the masculine use, cf. M. of V. iii. 4. 7, 17, etc. 

5. 6. Dowden asks : " May we infer from these lines (and 10) 
that S. had a sense of the wonderful progress of poetry in the time 
of Elizabeth ? " The reference is probably to the general im- 
provement that may be expected in the future. 

7. Reserve. Preserve ; as in Per. iv. 1 . 40 : — 

" reserve 
That excellent complexion," etc c 

XXXIII 

" A new group seems to begin with this sonnet. It introduces 
the wrongs done to S. by his friend" (Dowden). 

2. Flatter. " As a sovereign flatters a courtier with a look " 
(Wyndham). Cf. Sonn. 25. 4 fol. 

4. Heavenly alchemy. Cf. K.John, iii. 1. 77: — 
" To solemnize this day the glorious sun 
Stays in his course and plays the alchemist, 
Turning with splendour of his precious eye 
The meagre cloddy earth to glittering gold." 

See also M. N. D. iii. 2. 391-393. 

6. Rack. A mass of floating clouds. Cf. Temp. iv. I. 156, A. 
and C. iv. 14. 10, etc. Dyce quotes Bacon, Sylva Sylvarum, 115 : 
" The winds in the upper region, which move the clouds above 
(which we call the rack)." On the passage, Capell compares 
I Hen. IV. i. 2. 221 fol. 

7. Forlorn. Accented on the first syllable because followed by 
a noun so accented. Cf. T. G. of V. i. 2. 124 : " Poor forlorn Pro- 
teus, passionate Proteus." For the other accent, see R. of L. 1500 
and L. L. L. v. 2. 805. See also on 107. 4 below. 



Notes 167 

9. Even so my sun, etc. A Mr. G. T. Smith, of Tasmania 
{Victorian Rev. Dec. 1879), says: "The secret of the Sonnets [the 
first 1 26 J is simple. They were addressed to Shakespeare's son ; 
not a son by Anne Hathaway, but to an illegitimate one by some 
other woman. — The evidence would go to show by some woman of 
high rank. . . . Sonnet 33 is conclusive, even if we did not know 
Shakespeare's love of the pun or play on a word : ' Even so my 
sun? etc." This strikes me as " simple " in another sense". 

12. The region cloud. S. uses region several times as = air or 
airy. Cf. Ham. ii. 2. 509 : — 

" the dreadful thunder 
Doth rend the region ;" 

and again in 607 : " the region kites." 

14. Stain. Grow dim, as if stained ox. soiled. Cf. L. L. L. ii. I. 
48 : " If virtue's gloss will stain with any soil," etc. Cf. the tran- 
sitive use in 35. 3 below. See also the noun in V. and A. 9 : 
" Stain to all nymphs" (that is, by eclipsing them), etc. 

XXXIV 

A continuation of the preceding sonnet. 

4. Rotten smoke. Cf. " rotten damps," (R. of L. 778), " rotten 
dews" {Cor. ii. 3. 35), "reek of the rotten fens" {Id. iii. 3. 121), 
and " Rotten humidity," {T. of A. iv. 3. 2). In all these passages 
it refers to unwholesome vapours. For bravery, cf. brave in 12. 2. 

12. Cross. The quarto has " losse ; " corrected by Malone 
(the conjecture of Capell). Cf. 42. 12 and 133. 8. 

XXXV 

4. Canker. Canker-worm ; as in 70. 7, 95. 2, and 99. 12 below. 

5. Make faults. Cf. R. of L. 804 : " all the faults which in thy 
reign are made; " W. T. iii. 2. 218 : "All faults I make," etc. 

6. Authorizing. Accented on the second syllable, as elsewhere 



1 68 Notes 

in S. For compare, see on 21. 5 above. The meaning is : " giving 
a precedent for thy fault by comparing it with mine." (Palgrave) ; 
or with that of other men, as the context implies. 

7. Amiss. For the noun, cf. 151. 3 below and Ham. iv. 5. 18. 
The line seems to mean : sinning myself in palliating your offence. 

8. Thy . . . thy. The quarto reads " their . . . their ; " cor- 
rected by Malone. Steevens explains the line thus : " Making 
the excuse more than proportioned to the offence." 

9. Sense. Reason. Malone conjectured "incense" for in sense. 
Dowden says : " If we receive the present text, ' thy adverse 
party ' must mean Shakspere. But may we read : — 

' For to thy sensual fault I bring in sense, [that is, judgment, 
Thy adverse party, as thy advocate.' reason] 

Sense — against which he has offended — brought in as his advo- 
cate ? " It seems to me better to connect it with the following 
line, as the original text does. No change is called for. 

12. Love and hate. Love for his friend, hate for his conduct. 

13. Accessary. Accomplice. The word occurs again in R. of L. 
1658, with the same accent as here. S. does not use accessory. 

14. Sweet thief. Cf. 40. 9 : " gentle thief." For sourly Gildon 
has "sorely." 

XXXVI 

I. We two must be twain. Malone compares T. and C. iii. I. 
no : "She '11 none of him ; they two are twain." 

4. Borne. The Variorum of 182 1 misprints "born." 

5. Respect. Regard, affection ; as in M. N. D. ii. I. 209, Lear, 
i. I. 128, etc. Dowden quotes Cor. iii. 3. 112 : — 

" I do love 
My country's good with a respect more tender, 
More holy and profound than my own life." 

Palgrave explains one respect as = " one thing we look to," and 
Tyler as = " perfect similarity," 



Notes 169 



6. A separable spite. " A cruel fate that spitefully separates us 
from each other" (Malone). Separable is used by S. only here. 
For the active use of adjectives in -ble, cf. comfortable (Lear, i. 4. 
328), deceivable (T. N. iv. 3. 21, Rich. II. ii. 3. 8), etc. 

9. Evermore. Walker conjectures " ever more." 

10. My beivailed guilt. Explained by Spalding and others as 
"the blots that remain with S. on account of his profession" as an 
actor ; but Dowden thinks the meaning may be : "I may not 
claim you as a friend, lest my relation to the dark woman — now a 
matter of grief — should convict you of faithlessness in friendship." 
The interpretation of many expressions in the Sonnets must depend 
upon the theory we adopt concerning their autobiographical or 
non-autobiographical character, and their relations to one another. 

12. That ho7iour. The honour you give me. 

13, 14. These lines are repeated at the end of Sonn. 96. See 
p. 13 above. 

XXXVII 

3. So I, made lame. Cf. 89. 3 below : " Speak of my lameness, 
and I straight will halt." Capeli and others have inferred that 
S. was literally lame. Malone remarks : " In the 89th Sonnet the 
poet speaks of his friend's imputing to him a fault of which he was 
not guilty, and yet, he says, he would acknowledge it : so (he adds) 
were he to be described as lame, however untruly, yet rather than 
his friend should appear in the wrong, he would immediately halt. 
If S. was in truth lame, he had it not in his power to halt occasion- 
ally for this or any other purpose. The defect must have been 
fixed and permanent. The context in the verse before us in like 
manner refutes this notion. If the words are to be understood 
literally, we must then suppose that our admired poet was also poor 
and despised, for neither of which suppositions is there the smallest 
ground." Dowden says : " S. uses to lame in the sense of disable ; 
here the worth and truth of his friend are set over against the 
lameness of S. ; the lameness, then, is metaphorical — a disability 



170 



Notes 



to join in the joyous movement of life, as his friend does." Fleay 
believes that the lameness is "that of Shakespeare's verses." 

Dearest. Most intense; as often. Cf. Ham. i. 2. 182 : "my 
dearest foe," etc. 

7. Entitled in thy parts. Finding their title or claim to the 
throne in thy qualities. Cf. R. of L. 57 : — 

" But beauty, in that white intituled, 
From Venus' doves doth challenge that fair field ; " 

Malone explains entitled as " ennobled." The quarto has " their 
parts," which Schmidt would retain, explaining the passage thus : 
" or more excellencies, having a just claim to the first place as their 
due." Wyndham reads "Intituled" and retains "their," seeing 
allusions to heraldry in the passage. 

10. Shadow. S. is fond of contrasting shadow and substance. 
Cf. M. W. ii. 2. 215, M. of V. iii. 2. 128, Rich. II. ii. 2. 14, etc. 



XXXVIII 

3. Argument. Theme, subject ; as in 76. 10, 79. 5, 100. 8, 
103. 3, 105. 9, etc. 

6. Stand against thy sight. Endure thy sight. 

8. Invention. Imagination, or the poetic faculty. Cf. 76. 6, 
103. 7, and 105. n below. To give it light = cause it, bring it to 
light. 

12. Date. Time ; as often. Cf. 122. 4, 123. 5, etc. 

1 2. Curious. Fastidious, critical. Cf. A. IV. i. 2. 20 : — 

" Frank Nature, rather curious than in haste, 
• Hath well compos'd thee." 

Prof. Karl Goedeke (Deutsche Rundschau, March, 1877) believes 
that this sonnet was addressed to Queen Elizabeth. He says that 
29, 44, 45, 48, 50, 51, and 97 were addressed to his wife, and 108 
to his son Hamnet, 



Notes 171 



xxxix 

7. That by this separation, etc. " Separation justifies the poet's 
praise of his friend, which was not justified while their dear love 
was undivided ; for to praise him then was to praise himself, since 
they were one, the friend being all the better part of the poet" 
(Wyndham). 

12. Which time and thoughts, etc. Which doth so sweetly be- 
guile time and thoughts. Malone takes thoughts to be = melan- 
choly. See on 44. 9 below. The quarto has " dost " for doth ; 
corrected by Malone. Wyndham retains and defends " dost." 

13, 14. "Absence teaches how to make of the absent beloved 
two persons : one, absent in reality ; the other, present to imagi- 
nation " (Dowden). 

XL 

This sonnet, like the one before it and the two that follow, 
refers to the theft of the poet's mistress by his friend. But the 
poet and his friend being one, no fraud or robbery could be 
committed. 

5, 6. Then if for love of me you receive her whom I love, I can- 
not blame you for using her. For in 6 = because ; as in 54. 9 and 
106. 11 below. On the passage, cf. 1 Hen. VI. v. 3. 77, Rich III. 
i. 2. 228, and T. A. ii. 1. 82. 

7, 8. "Yet you are to blame if you deceive yourself by an un- 
lawful union while you refuse loyal wedlock" (Dowden). The 
quarto has " this selfe " for thyself; corrected by Gildon. Wynd- 
ham retains "this self," as referring to "the identity of himself 
and his friend, stated in 39. 1-4 and re-stated in 42. 13, 14." 
He also quotes 133. 6 and 135. 14. He takes what thyself refusest 
to mean "my love for you." 

10. All my poverty. The poor little that I have. Cf. 103. I 
below. Thee is the " ethical dative." 



171 Notes 



XLI 

i. Pretty. Bell and Palgrave read "petty." Cf. M. of V. ii. 6. 

37 : — 

" But love is blind, and lovers cannot see 

The pretty follies that themselves commit." 
Liberty = license ; as often. Cf. Ham.\\. I. 24, 32, etc. 
3. Befits. The singular verb is often found with two singular 
subjects. 

5, 6. Gentle thou art, etc. Steevens quotes I Hen. VI. v. 3. 77 : — 
" She's beautiful, and therefore to be woo'd ; 
She is a woman, therefore to be won." 

8. She have. The quarto reads " he have ; " corrected by 
Malone (the conjecture of Tyrwhitt). Dowden and Wyndham 
think that the old text may be right. 

9. Ay me ! Hudson and some others read " Ah me ! " which 
is not found in S. except in R. and J. v. I. 10, where it may be a 
misprint. Ay me ! occurs very often. 

My seat. Malone reads : " thou mightst, my sweet, forbear ; " 
but the old reading is confirmed and explained by Oth. ii. 1. 304 : — 
" I do suspect the lusty Moor 
Hath leap'd into my seat." 
Dr. Ingleby adds, as a parallel, R. of L. 412, 413. 

10. Chide. Check or restrain the beauty that leads you astray. 
Cf. 8. 7 above. 

12. Truth. Duty, allegiance ; that of the lady to S. and the 
friend to S. — therefore twofold. 

XLII 

This sonnet closes the group that began with 33. 

7. Abuse me. Use me ill. 

9. My love's gain. That is, my mistress's gain. 

11. Both twain. Cf. L. L. L. v. 2. 459 : " I remit both twain." 

12. This cross. Cf. 34. 12 and 133. 8. 



Notes 173 



XLIII 

1. Wink. Shut my eyes. Cf. 56. 6 and V. and A. 121, etc. 
See also the noun in Temp. ii. 1. 285, W. T. i. 2. 317, etc. 

2. Unrespected. Unnoticed, unregarded ; as in 54. 10 below, 
the only other instance of the word in S. 

4. And darkly bright, etc. "Become bright, though not seeing, 
when, though closed, they are directed in the darkness" (Tyler). 
Cf. Sonn. 27, where the sleepless eyes are described as seeing his 
friend's image in the darkness of night. 

5. Whose shadow, etc. Whose image makes bright the shadows, 
or shades, of night. 

II. Thy. The quarto again misprints " their." 
13, 14. All days are nights to see, etc. "All days are gloomy 
to behold," etc. (Steevens). Malone wished to read "nights to 
me ; " and Lettsom conjectured : — 

" All days are nights to me till thee I see, 
And nights bright days when dreams do show me thee." 
Thee me = thee to me. 

XLIV 

The poet explains that the elements of fire and air are with his 
friend, leaving himself only the heavier ones of earth and water. 

I. Thought. Which can fly whither it will. 

4. From. Gildon has " To." Where = to where. 

6. Farthest earth removed. That is, earth farthest removed. For 
the transposition, cf. in. 2 below. 

9. Thought kills me. Here thought probably = " melancholy 
contemplation." Cf. A. and C. iv. 6. 35, etc. 

II. So much of earth and water wrought. That is, so much of 
these baser elements being wrought into my nature. The allusion 
is to the old idea of the four elements entering into the composition 
of man. Cf. T. N. ii. 3. 10 : " Does not our life consist of the four 
elements?" and Hen. V. iii. 7. 22 : " He is pure air and fire, and the 



174 Notes 



dull elements of earth and water never appear in him," etc. See 
also A. and C. v. 2. 292. Walker quotes Chapman, Iliad, vii. : — 
" But ye are earth and water all, which — symboliz'd [that is, collected] 
in one — 
Have fram'd your faint unfiery spirits." 
12. Attend time's leisure. Await the lapse of time. 
14. Heavy tears. Heavy because due to these elements of earth 
and water. 

XLV 

This sonnet and the next continue the reference to the elements. 
4. Present-absent. The hyphen was inserted by Malone. 

8. Sinks down. This would be an ordinary " female " line, if it 
were not for the rhyme with thee, which requires melancholy to be 
pronounced melancholy. 

9. Recur 'd. Restored to health. Cf. V. and A. 465 : "A smile 
recures the wounding of a frown." See also Rich. III. iii. 7. 130. 

12. Thy. Again "their" in the quarto ; corrected by Malone. 

XLVI 

3. Thy. The quarto has "their," as in 8, 13, and 14 below; 
corrected by Malone. Tyler understands the picture to be a real 
portrait of his friend, but this does not seem to me certain. Cf. 
Sonn. 24. The contest of eye and heart may be concerning the 
imaginary picture of his person and the image of him in the heart. 

9. ' Cide. The quarto has "side ; " corrected by Sewell (2d ed.)„ 
Wyndham makes " side " = " adjudge this title to one or the other 
side." 

10. Quest. Inquest, or jury ; as in Rich. III. i. 4. 189: — 

" What lawful quest have given their verdict up 
Unto the frowning judge ? " 

12. Moiety. Share, portion ; not necessarily an exact half. Cf. 
M. of V. iv. 1. 26, Ham. i. 1. 90, etc. 

13. Mine eye's due, etc, Cf, Sonn. 24. 13, 14, 



Notes 



XLVII 



75 



Continues the subject of eye and heart. 

I. Took. S. has both took and token (or la' en) for the participle. 
3. Famished for a look. Cf. 75. 10 below. Malone quotes C. of 

R. ii. I. 88 : " Whilst I at home starve for a merry look." 

9. Thy picture or. Lintott has " the picture or," and Gildon 
" the picture of." 

10. Art. The quarto has " are ; " corrected by Malone. 

II. Not. The quarto has "nor ; " corrected in the ed. of 1640. 
With Sonn. 46, 47, Dowden compares Sonnets 19, 20 of Wat- 
son's Tears of Fancie, 1593 (ed. Arber, p. 188) : — 

" My hart impos'd this penance on mine eies, 
(Eies the first causers of my harts lamenting) : 
That they should weepe till loue and fancie dies, 
Fond loue the last cause of my harts repenting. 
Mine eies vpon my hart inflict this paine 
(Bold hart that dard to harbour thoughts of loue) 
That it should loue and purchase fell disdaine, 
A grieuous penance which my heart doth proue, 
Mine eies did weep as hart had them imposed, 
My hart did pine as eies had it constrained," etc. 
Sonnet 20 continues the same : — 

" My hart accus'd mine eies and was offended, 



Hart said that loue did enter at the eies, 

And from the eies descended to the hart ; 

Eies said that in the hart did sparkes arise," etc. 
Cf. also Diana (ed. 1584), Sixth Decade, Sonnet 7 (Arber's Eng- 
lish Garner ; and Drayton, Idea, 33). 

XLVIII 

Written during a journey. 

4. Hands of falsehood. Hands of the false or fraudulent. 

6. My greatest grief Because of his fear of theft. 



176 Notes 

7. Best of dearest. An emphasized superlative. 

11. Gentle closure of my breast. Cf. V. and A. 781 : "Into the 
quiet closure of my breast." 

14. Dowden asks : " Does not this refer to the woman who has 
sworn love (152. 2), and whose truth to S. (spoken of in 41. 13) 
now proves thievish ? " The meaning here, however, may simply 
be that so rich a prize may tempt even true men to become thieves. 
Capell compares V. and A. 724 : " Rich preys make true men 
thieves." The antithesis of true men and thieves occurs often in S. 
and other writers of the time. 

XLIX 

"Notice the construction of the sonnet, each of the quatrains 
beginning with the same words, 'Against that time ; ' so also 64, 
three quatrains beginning with the words ' When I have seen.' So 
Daniel's sonnet beginning ' If this be love,' repeated in the first 
line of each quatrain" (Dowden). Cf. also a sonnet by Barnabe 
Karnes quoted in Appendix. 

3. Whenas. When ; as in C. of E. iv. 4. 140, V. and A. 999, etc. 

4. Advis'd respects. Deliberate considerations ; as in K. fohn, 
iv. 2. 214 : " More upon humour than advis'd respects." 

7. Converted. Changed. Steevens compares J. C. iv. 2. 20: — 

" When love begins to sicken and decay, 
It useth an enforced ceremony." 

8. Reasons. That is, for the change it has undergone. 

10. Desert. Rhyming with part, and spelled " desart " in the 
quarto. See on 14. 12 and 17. 2 above. Cf. 72. 6 below. 
13. The strength of laws. Absolute legal right. 



This sonnet and the next appear to refer to the journey alluded 
to in Sonn. 48. Fleay thinks that the journey (like the absence 
and travel in other Sonnets) is purely figurative, referring to " the 



Notes 177 

separation between Southampton and Shakespeare, caused by the 
metaphorical unfaithfulness of the latter in producing not poems 
dedicated to him, but only dramas destined for the multitude." 
The horse or beast ridden by S. is Pegasus ! 

3. That ease and that repose. Which he will find at the end of 
the weary journey. 

6. Dully. The quarto has " duly; " corrected in the ed. of 1640. 

7. Instinct. Accented on the last syllable, as regularly in S. 



LI 

4. Posting. Rapid travelling, with frequent change of horses. 

6. Szvift extremity. The extreme of swiftness. 

7. Mounted on the wind. Cf. A. Y. L. iii. 2. 95 and Cymb. iii. 

4- 37- 

8. In winged speed. Even if I had wings, or could fly like a bird. 
10-12. Therefore Desire, etc. " He will dispense with his horse, 

and run or fly back, riding on no dull flesh, but borne on the wings 
of Desire" (Tyler). 

Perfecfsl. The quarto has "perfects," and Gildon "perfect." 
Perfecfst is due to Dyce. For the superlative, cf. Much Ado, ii. 
1. 317 : " Silence is the perfectest herald of joy." 

Shall neigh — no dull flesh, etc. The quarto reads "shall naigh 
noe dull flesh," etc. Malone was the first to make no dull flesh 
parenthetical. Dowden thinks the meaning may be, " Desire, 
which is all love, shall neigh, there being no dull flesh to cumber 
him as he rushes forward in his fiery race." Massey makes flesh 
the object of neigh (= neigh to). 

13. Wilful-slow. The hyphen is due to Malone. 

14. Go. The word here, as most of the critics agree, seems to 
have the specific sense of walking as opposed -to running. Cf. 
Temp. iii. 2. 22 : — 

" Stephano. We '11 not run, Monsieur monster. 
Trinculo. Nor go neither ; " 
Shakespeare's sonnets — 12 



178 Notes 



and T. G. ofV. iii. 1. 388 : "Thou must run to him, for thou hast 
stayed so long that going will scarce serve thy turn." Schmidt de- 
fines go in these two passages as = " walk leisurely, not to run ; " 
but the instance in the text he puts under the head of go = " make 
haste." Tyler makes give him leave to go — " dismiss him, or let 
him go at his pleasure." 

LII 

This sonnet expresses his delight at returning to his friend. 

I. Key. Pronounced kay in the time of S. Note the rhyme 
with survey. 

4. For blunting. For fear of blunting. Cf. T. G. of V. i. 2. 
136: "Yet here they, shall not lie, for catching cold;" and 
2 Hen. VI. iv. 1. 74: — 

" Now will I dam up this thy yawning mouth, 
For swallowing the treasure of the realm." 

5. Therefore are feasts, etc. Cf. 1 Hen. IV. i. 2. 229 : — 

" If all the year were playing holidays, 
To sport would be as tedious as to work ; 
But when they seldom come they wish'd for come, 
And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents ; " 

and Id. iii. 2. 57 : — 

" and so my state, 
Seldom but sumptuous, showed like a feast, 
And won by rareness such solemnity." 
8. Captain. Chief. For the adjective use, cf. 66. 12 below. 
For carcanet — necklace, see C. of E. iii. I. 4, the only other instance 
of the word in S. 

II. Special. Used adverbially, as adjectives often are in S. 

LIII 

His friend's shadow, or image, is to be seen in every beautiful 
person or thing ; but his constant heart — his faithful affection — 
has no parallel or counterpart. 



Notes 179 

2. Strange. Stranger, not your own. 

4. " You, although but one person, can give off all manner of 
shadowy images. Shakspere then, to illustrate this, chooses the 
most beautiful of men, Adonis, and the most beautiful of women, 
Helen ; both are but shadows or counterfeits (or pictures, as in 
Sonn. 16) of the 'master-mistress' of his passion " (Dowden). 

5. Counterfeit. Portrait; as in 16. 8 above, T. of A. v. 1. 83, 
etc. On the rhyme with set, Walker remarks that -feit was pro- 
nounced nearly as fate ; and so of ei generally. He quotes Ford, 
Perkin Warbeck, iii. 2, where Katherine, referring to the word 

counterfeit, says : — 

" Pray do not use 
That word ; it carries fate in 't." 

In C. of E. iv. 2. 63 straight rhymes with conceit ; and in L. L. L. 
v. 2. 399, conceit with wait. Many similar examples might be cited. 

7. Helen's cheek. Cf. A. Y. L. iii. 2. 153: " Helen's cheek, but 
not her heart." 

8. Tires. Head-dresses. Cf. T. G. of V. iv. 4. 190 : — 

" If I had such a tire, this face of mine 
Were full as lovely as is this of hers," etc. 
In the present passage, the word may possibly be a contraction of 
attires. 

9. Foison. Plenty, harvest (here = autumn). Cf. Te?np. ii. 1. 
163, iv. 1. no, Macb. iv. 3. 88, etc. On the passage, Malone com- 
pares A. and C. v. 2. 86 : — 

" For his bounty, 
There was no winter in 't ; an autumn 't was 
That grew the more by reaping." 

LIV 

This sonnet continues the subject of 53, taking up the sentiment 
of the last line. Beauty is enhanced by truth, or the beauty of 
character ; as the rose by its fragrance, which, distilled, is more 
enduring than its beauty. 



i8o Notes 

5. Canker-blooms. Dog-roses. Cf. Much Ado, i. 3. 28 : "I had 
rather be a canker in a hedge than a rose in his grace ; " and 
I Hen. IV. i. 3. 76 : — 

" To put down Richard, that sweet lovely rose, 
And plant this thorn, this canker, Bolingbroke." 

Steevens says that the dog-rose is paler than the cultivated rose, 
and has some odour ; and therefore the text is inconsistent. But 
the perfume of the dog-rose would never be distilled ; and that is 
the point of the poet's comparison. 

6. The perfumed tincture. The combined colour and fragrance. 

8. Discloses. Uncloses, unfolds. Cf. Ham. i. 3. 40 : — 

" The canker galls the infants of the spring 
Too oft before their buttons be disclos'd." 

9. For. Because ; as in 106. 1 1 below. See also on 40. 6 
above. 

10. Unrespected. Unregarded. Cf. 43. 2 above. 

12. Sweetest odours. For the allusion to distillation of perfumes, 
see on 5. 9 above. 

14. Vade. Fade. The quarto has " by verse ; " corrected by 
Malone. That refers to the abstract youth implied in the concrete 
youth. Vade occurs also in Rich. II. i. 2. 20 (folio text), and in 
P.P. 131, 132, 170,174, 176. 

LV 

This sonnet, like 54, seems to take up the closing line of the 
preceding one. 

Mr. Tyler (Athenceum, Sept. 11, 1880) ingeniously argues that 
the thought and phrasing of lines in this sonnet are derived from 
a passage in Meres's Palladis Tamia,. 1598, where Shakespeare 
among others is mentioned with honour : — 
" As Ovid saith of his worke ; 

Jamque opus exegi, quod nee Jovis ira, nee ignis, 
JSlec poterit ferrum, nee edax abolere vetustas ; 



Notes 1 8 1 

And as Horace saith of his : — 

Exegi monumenfum aere perennius, 
Regalique situ pyramidum altius ; 
Quod non imber edax, non Aquilo impotens 
Possit diruere, ant innumerabilis 
Annorum series et fuga temporum : 

So say I seuerally of Sir Philip Sidneys, Spencers, Daniels, Dray- 
tons, Shakespeares, and Warners vvorkes ; 

Nee Jovis ira, imbres, Mars , ferrum, flamma, senectus. 
Hoc opus unda, lues, turbo, venena ruent. 

Et quanquam ad pulcherrimum hoc opus euertendum tres illi Di 
conspirabunt, Chronus, Vulcanus, et Pater ipse gentis : — 

Nee tamen annorum series, non flamma, nee ensis, 
Aeternuvi potuit hoc abolere decus." 

i. Monuments. The quarto has "monument;" corrected by 
Malone. 

3. These contents. What is contained in these verses of mine. 

7. Mars his sword. Cf. T. and C. ii. 1. 58: "Mars his idiot," 
etc. 

9. All-oblivious. Causing to be forgotten. Cf. oblivious in Macb. 
v. 3. 43 ; the only other instance of the word in S. 

10. Pace forth. Still go on, or endure. 

13. Till the judgment, etc. Till the judgment day shall bid you 
rise from the dead. Hudson has this strange note : " Arise is here 
used transitively, and is put in the plural for the rhyme, though its 
subject is in the singular: 'Till the judgment day that raises your- 
self from the dead,' is the meaning." This is the sense, but not 
the syntax. 

LVI 

"This, like the sonnets immediately preceding, is written in 
absence. The love S. addresses (' Sweet love, renew thy force ') is 
the love in his own breast. Is the sight of his friend, of which he 



1 82 Notes 

speaks, only the imaginative seeing of love ; such fancied sight as 
two betrothed persons may have although severed by the ocean ? " 
(Dowden.) 

6. Wink. Close in sleep, as after a full meal. See on 43. 1 
above. 

8. Dullness. Apparently = drowsiness, as in Temp. i. 2. 185 : 
"'Tis a good dullness." 

13. Else. The quarto has "As; " corrected by Palgrave. Ma- 
lone and Tyler read " Or." 

LVII 

"The absence spoken of in this sonnet seems to be voluntary 
absence on the part of Shakspere's friend" (Dowden). 

5. World-without-end hour. The time that seems as if it would 
never end. Cf. L. L. L. v. 2. 799 : " a world-without-end bargain." 

12. Where you are, etc. How happy you make those where 
you are. 

13. Will. The quarto has "Will" (not in italics). As Tyler 
remarks, " there is a bare possibility of a pun." Cf. Sonn. 135, 136. 



LVIII 

This sonnet is a continuation of 57 ; expressing a "growing dis- 
trust in his friend, with a determination to resist such a feeling " 
(Dowd^en). 

3. To crave. The to of the infinitive is sometimes expressed in 
a clause following one with should, would, etc. Cf. Temp. iii. 1. 62, 
T. of A. iv. 2. 23, etc. 

6. The imprisoned absence of your liberty. The separation from 
you, which to me is imprisonment, while you are at liberty. 

7. Tame to sufferance. Bearing the suffering submissively. Ma- 
lone compares Lear, iv. 6. 225 : " made tame to fortune's blows." 
Bide each check = endure each rebuke or rebuff. 



Notes 183 



10. Your time To what, etc. Devoting your time, as is your 
privilege, to what you will. 

13. Though waiting so be hell. Cf. p. 120. 6 and R. of L. 1287. 

LIX 

Here, as Tyler notes, there is " pretty clearly a break of conti- 
nuity." 

5. Record. History ; accented by S. on either syllable, as suits 
the measure. Cf. 122. 8 below. 

6. Courses. Yearly courses, not daily. Cf. Hen. VIII. ii. 3. 6 : 

" After 
So many courses of the sun enthron'd ; " 

T. and C. iv. 1. 27 : "A thousand complete courses of the sun," 
etc. 

7. Antique. For the accent, see on 19. 10 above. 

8. Since mind, etc. Since thought was first expressed in 
writing. 

10. Composed wonder. Wonderful composition. For many simi- 
lar inversions, see Schmidt, p. 141 7. 

11. Or whether. The quarto has "or where," and some modern 
eds. print " whe'r " or " wher." Whether is not unfrequently mono- 
syllabic. 

12. Or zuhether revolution, etc. Whether the revolution of time 
brings about the same things. 

LX 

"The thought of revolution, the revolving ages (59. 12), sets the 
poet thinking of changes wrought by time" (Dowden). 

I. Like as. Cf. 118. 1 below. See also T. and C. i. 2. 7, Ham. 
i. 2. 217, etc. 

5. Nativity, etc. The child once brought into this world of 
light. " As the main of waters would signify the great body of 



184 Notes 



waters, so the main of light signifies the mass or flood of light into 
which a new-born child is launched" (Knight). Perhaps, as 
Dowden suggests, the image in main of light is suggested by line I, 
where our minutes are compared to waves. 

7. Crooked. Malignant. Cf. T. G. of V. iv. 1.22: "If crooked 
fortune had not thwarted me, 1 ' etc. For the allusion to the sup- 
posed evil influence of eclipses, cf. 107. 5 below. See also Macb. 
iv. I. 28, Ham. i. I. 120, Lear, i. 2. 112, Oth. v. 2. 99, etc. 

8. Confound. Destroy; as often. See on 5. 6 above and 63. 
10 below. 

9. Flourish. "External decoration" (Malone). Cf. L. L. L. 
ii. I. 14: "the painted flourish of your praise," etc. Transfix 
(used by S. only here) = remove, take away. 

10. Delves the parallels. Makes furrows. For the figure, cf. 
2. 2 above ; and for a different one, see 19. 9. Parallels is used 
more mathematically in T. and C. i. 3. 168. 

11. Feeds on, etc. Consumes whatever is rarest, or best, in 
natural beauty and worth. 

13. Times in hope. Future times. 

LXI 

This sonnet reminds us of 27 and 28. 

8. Tenor. The quarto has " tenure ; " corrected by Malone. 
11. Defeat. Destroy. Cf. Oth. iv. 2. 160: "His unkindness 
may^defeat my life," etc. 

LXII 

With this sonnet compare 22. 

1. Self-love. Cf. 3. 8 above. 

5. Gracious. Full of grace, beautiful. Cf. K. John, hi. 4. 81 : 
"a gracious creature;" T. ■ N. i. 5. 281: "A gracious person," 
etc. 

7. And for myself, etc. Walker conjectures "so define," and 



Notes 185 



Lettsom "so myself." Dowden asks: " Does for myself mean 'for 
my own satisfaction ' ? " Perhaps it merely adds emphasis to the 
statement. 

8. As I, etc. In such a way that I, etc. 

10. Bated. The quarto has " beated," which was probably an 
error of the ear for bated (= beaten down, weakened ; as in M. of 
V. iii. 3. 32 : "These griefs and losses have so bated me," etc.), beat 
being then pronounced bate. " Beated " is explained by Tyler as 
"battered." S. has splitted in C. of E. i. I. 104, v. I. Tp?>,A.and C. 
v. 1. 24, etc., catched in L. L. L. v. 2. 69, becomed in R. and J. iv. 
2. 26, Cymb. v. 5. 406, etc Steevens would read " blasted," and 
Colliei " beaten," which White adopts. 

For chopped (the quarto chopt) Dyce and others read " chapp'd," 
which is really the same word. The form in S. is always chopt or 
chopped. 

13. 'T is thee, myself That is, thee, who art my other self. 

14. Painting my age, etc. Cf. L. L. L. iv. 3. 244. 

LXIII 

A continuation of 62. 

5. Steepy night. Malone was at first inclined to read "sleepy 
night," but afterwards decided that steepy is explained by 7. 5, 6 
above. Dowden takes the same view: "Youth and age are on the 
steep ascent and the steep decline of heaven." Staunton says: 
"Chaucer \_C. T. 201, 755] has ' eyen stepe,' which his editors 
interpret 'eyes deep.' We believe in both cases the word is a 
synonym for black or darky Hudson reads "sleepy." 

6. King. Sovereign possessor. Cf. T. N. i. 1. 39, etc. 

9. For such a time. That is, in anticipation of it. Fortify — 
fortify myself, take defensive measures. Cf. 2 Hen. IV. i. 3. 56: 
" We fortify in paper and in figures." 

10. Confounding. Destroying. See on 60. 8 above. 
13. Black lines. Cf. 65. 14 above. 



1 86 Notes 



LXIV 

This sonnet also continues the thought of the preceding. Pal- 
grave remarks that the three sonnets 64-66 " form one poem of 
marvellous power, insight, and beauty." 

2. Rich proud. Hyphened by Malone, like down-ras'd below. - 
Cost = that on which money is spent. Cf. 2 Hen. IV. i. 3. 60. 

4. Mortal. Deadly, fatal; as in 46. I, etc. 

5. When I have seen the hungry ocean, etc. Some critics have 
expressed surprise that S. should know anything of these gradual 
encroachments of the sea on the land ; but they had become 
familiar on the east coast of England before his day, as at Ravens- 
purg {Rich. II. ii. 1. 296, etc.). Cf. 2 Hen. IV. iii. 1. 45 : — 

" O God ! that one might read the book of fate, 
And see the revolution of the times 
Make mountains level, and the continent, 
Weary of solid firmness, melt itself 
Into the sea ! and, other times, to see 
The beachy girdle of the ocean 
Too wide for Neptune's hips," etc. 
See also Tennyson, In Memoriam, cxxiii. 

13. This thought, etc. This thought, which cannot choose but 
weep ... is as a death. 

14. To have. At having ; the " indefinite " infinitive, which is 
very common in S. 

\ LXV 

A sequel to 64. 

3. This rage. Malone conjectured " his rage." Rage — de- 
structive power. Cf. 13. 12 and 64. 4. 

4. Action. Energy, vigour. Dowden thinks it is used in a 
legal sense, suggested by hold a plea. 

5. Summer's. The summer of life. 

6. Wrackful. The quarto has " wrackfull ; " the only instance 
of the word in S. Cf, ivrack-threatening in R. of I. 590. Wrack 



Notes 187 



is the only spelling in the early eds. Note the rhyme in 126. 5 
below. 

10. Chest. Theobald conjectured " quest ; " but, as Malone 
shows, the figure is a favourite one with S. Cf. 48. 9 above ; and 
see also K. John, v. 1. 40, Rich. II. i. 1. 180, etc. Time's chest — 
the oblivion to which he consigns our precious things. Cf. 52. 9 
above. 

12. Of beauty. The quarto has "or" for of, and Gildon reads 
" on." 

LXVI 

" The tone of melancholy now attains a greater intensity, and we 
have a pessimism which has been compared to that of Hamlet. . . . 
The poet cries out for death, though unwilling to leave his friend" 
(Tyler). 

1. All these. The evils enumerated below. 

2. Born. Staunton conjectures " lorn," and " empty " for needy. 

8. Disabled. A quadrisyllable. Cf. assembly in Cor. i. I. 159, 
nobler (trisyllable) in Id. iii. 2. 66, etc. 

9. Art made tongue-tied, etc. " Art is commonly used by S. for 
letters, learning, science. Can this line refer to the censorship of 
the stage ? " (Dowden). It may be censorship in a general sense; 
or legal authority used to suppress freedom of speech. 

11. Simplicity. Folly; as in L. L. L. iv. 2. 23, iv. 3. 54, v. 2. 52, 
78, etc. 

12. And captive good, etc. "This is a climax. Evil is a victori- 
ous captain, with good as a captive attending to grace his triumph " 
(Tyler). 

LXVII 

The world being such as represented in the preceding sonnet, 
the excellencies of the poet's friend are out of place. He is 
Nature's memorial of a golden age long passed away (Tyler). 
This thought is developed in the next sonnet. 



1 88 Notes 

4. Lace. Embellish. Cf. Much Ado, iii. 4. 20 : " laced with 
silver," etc. 

6. Dead seeing. Lifeless semblance. Capell and Farmer con- 
jecture "seeming." 

8. Roses of shadotv. Imaginary roses, the mere shadow, or im- 
age, of the reality. 

9. Bankrupt. Spelled " banckrout " in the quarto, as often, or 
similarly ("bankrout," etc.), elsewhere. 

12. Proud of many, etc. "Nature, while she boasts of many 
beautiful persons, really has no treasure of beauty except his" 
(Dowden). 

13. Stores. See on II. 9 above. 

LXVIII 

I. Map of days outzvom. Malone compares R. of L. 1350 : 
" this pattern of the worn-out age." For map = picture, image, 
cf. R. of L. 402 : " the map of death ; " Rich. II. v. I. 12 : "Thou 
map of honour," etc. 

3. Fair. See on 16. 1 1 above. Bastard = illegitimate, as not 
derived from Nature. 

5, 6. For Shakespeare's antipathy to false hair, see note on 20. 1 
above. He likes to represent the hair as taken from the dead. 

10. Without all. That is, without any; as in 74. 2 below. For 
itself Malone conjectures " himself." It seems to be = its real self. 

LXIX 

His friend's beauty is generally admitted, but it is alleged that 
his moral character is not in keeping with it. 

3. Due. The quarto has " end ; " corrected by Malone (the 
conjecture of Capell and Tyrwhitt). 

5. Thy. The quarto has "Their; " corrected by Malone, who 
later substituted "Thine." 

7. Confound. Destroy. See on 5. 6 above. 



Notes 189 



14. Soil. The quarto has "solye," and the ed. of 1640 "soyle." 
Gildon has " toil." Malone (followed by Dyce, White, and Hud- 
son) reads "solve" (= solution). The Cambridge editors and 
Dowden give "soil," and the former say: "As the verb to soil is 
not uncommon in Old English, meaning to solve (as, for example, 
in Udal's Erasmus : ' This question could not one of them all 
soile '), so the substantive soil may be used in the sense of solution. 
The play upon words thus suggested is in the author's manner." 
Thou dost common grow ; that is, you get into bad company. 

LXX 

For this sonnet, see p. 25 above. 

1. Art. The quarto has "are ; " corrected in the ed. of 1640. 

2. Slander's mark, etc. Cf. M. for M. hi. 2. 197 and Ham. iii. 
I. 140. 

3. Suspect. Suspicion. For the noun, which S. uses some dozen 
times, cf. Rich. III. i. 3. 89, iii. 5. 32, etc. 

6. Thy. Again the quarto has " Their." The frequency of this 
mistake was apparently due to confusing the abbreviations of the 
words. 

Being woo'd of time. " Being solicited or tempted by the present 
times" (Dowden). Tyler connects it with slander, and explains 
the passage thus : " Slander coming under the soothing influence 
of time will show thy worth to be greater," or " slander will turn 
to praise in course of time, and your true character will shine forth." 
This seems, on the whole, more plausible, but neither explanation 
is convincing. Verity explains it as = " tempted by thy youth ; " 
comparing line 9 and Sonn. 12. 3, 4. Steevens quotes Jonson, 
Every Man Out of his Humour, prol. : "Oh, how I hate the mon- 
strousness of time" (that is, the times). Staunton conjectures 
" crime " for time. 

7. Canker. The canker-worm ; as in 35. 4 above, and 95. 2, 
99. 12 below. Cf. T. G. of V. i. 1. 45, M. N. D. ii. 2. 3, etc. 



190 Notes 

10. Charged. Attacked ; repeating assaiPd. 

12. To tie up. As to tie up, that is, silence. Cf. M. N. D. iii. 
I. 206: "Tie up my love's tongue, bring him silently." See also 
R. and J. iv. 5. 32 and M. for M. iii. 2. 199. Enlarged = set at 
large, given free scope. Hales writes to Dowden on this passage : 
" Surely a reference here to the Faerie Queene, end of book vi. 
Calidore ties up the Blatant Beast ; after a time he breaks his iron 
chain, ' and got into the world at liberty again,' that is, is evermore 
enlarged." It seems to me doubtful whether S. had this in mind. 

14. Owe. Own, possess. Cf. 18. 10 above. 

LXXI 

As Tyler remarks, " the melancholy train of thought, interrupted 
by the last two sonnets, reappears" — which tends to confirm the 
supposition that 69 and 70 are out of place. 

2. The surly sullen bell. Cf. 2 Hen. IV. i. 1. 102 : — 
" as a sullen bell 
Remember'd knolling a departed friend ; " 

R. and J. iv. 5. %>%-. "sullen dirges; " and Milton, // Pens. 76: 
" Swinging slow with sullen roar " (the curfew bell). 

4. Vilest. The quarto has " vildest." Vild is an old form of 
vile, found often in the early eds. 

10. Compounded am with clay. Ci. 2 Hen. IV. i\. $. 116: "Only 
compound me with forgotten dust." See also Ham. iv. 1. 236. 

LXXII 
A continuation of 71. 

4. Prove. Find ; as in R. of L. 613: " When they in thee the 
like offences prove," etc. See also 153. 7 below. 

5. Virtuous lie. Cf. Horace's " splendide mendax." Verity 
quotes Webster, Duchess of Malfi, iii. 2 : — 

" Of such a feigned crime as Tasso calls 
Magnanivia mensogna, a noble lie." 



Notes 191 

6. Desert. For the rhyme, cf. 14. 12, 17. 2, and 49. 10 above. 

7. /. Cf. 71/. of V. iii. 2. 321: "between you and I." The 
inflections of pronouns are often disregarded in S. 

8. Niggard truth. Strict truth. 
IO. Untrue. Used adverbially. 

14. So should you. That is, be shamed. To love = for loving. 

LXXIII 

The thought of death (in 71, 72) suggests his declining age. 
2. Yellow leaves. Cf. Macb. v. 3. 23 : — 

" my way of life 
Is fallen into the sere, the yellow leaf." 

4. Ruined choirs. The quarto has " rn'wd quiers ; " corrected 
in the ed. of 1640. Steevens remarks: "The image was probably 
suggested by our desolated monasteries. The resemblance between 
the vaulting of a Gothic aisle and an avenue of trees whose upper 
branches meet and form an arch overhead, is too striking not to 
be acknowledged. When the roof of the one is shattered, and the 
boughs of the other leafless, the comparison becomes yet more 
solemn and picturesque." 

8. Death's second self . Cf. Cymb. ii. 2. 31 : "the ape of death," 
etc. 

9. The glowing of such fire, etc. Malone remarks that Gray 
perhaps remembered these lines when he wrote " Even in our 
ashes live [not " glow," as Malone quotes it] their wonted fires." 

12. Consum'd, etc. "Wasting away on the dead ashes which 
once nourished it with living flame" (Dowden). 

LXXIV 

Closely connected with 73. 

I. That fell arrest. Capell quotes Ham. v. 2. 347 : — 
" Had I but time — as this fell sergeant, death, 
Is strict in his arrest." 



192 Notes 

2. Without all. See on 68. 10 above. 

6. Consecrate. Cf. C. of E.'\\.2. 134: " this body, consecrate to 
thee," etc. 

7. His. Its ; as in 9. 10 and 14. 6 above. 

II. The coward conquest, etc. Dowden asks: "Does S. merely 
speak of the liability of the body to untimely or violent mischance ? 
Or does he meditate suicide ? Or think of Marlowe's death, and 
anticipate such a fate as possibly his own ? Or has he, like Mar- 
lowe, been wounded ? Or does he refer to dissection of dead 
bodies ? Or is it ' confounding age's cruel knife ' of 63. 10? " If 
not a merely figurative expression, like this last, the key to it is 
probably in the first question above : this life which is at the mercy 
of any base assassin's knife. Palgrave says that the expression 
"must allude to anatomical dissections, then recently revived in 
Europe by Vesalius, Fallopius, Pare, and others." This seems to 
me extremely improbable. 

13, 14. The worth, etc. "The worth of that (my body) is that 
which it contains (my spirit), and that (my spirit) is this (my 
poems) " (Dowden). 

LXXV 

This sonnet and the two that follow, as Tyler suggests, seem to 
form a distinct group, accompanying the present referred to in 77. 

2. Sweet-season 'd. " Seasonable and refreshing " (Tyler) ; or 
"well tempered, soft, gentle" (Schmidt). The hyphen is due to 
Malone: 

3. The peace ofyori. "The peace, content, to be found in you ; 
antithesis to strife " (Dowden) ; or " the peaceable possession of 
you" (Tyler). 

6. Doubting. Suspecting, fearing. Cf. M. W. i. 4. 42 : "I doubt 
he be not well," etc. 

10. Clean. Quite, completely ; as often. On the line, cf. 47. 3 
above. 

11, 12. Possessing or pursuing, etc. That is, possessing no de- 



Notes 



93 



light save what is had, and pursuing none save what must be taken 
from you. Cf. 27. 13 above. For took, cf. 2 Hen. IV. i. 1. 131 : 
" Stumbling in fear, was took," etc. S. also uses taken (or ta'en) 
for the participle. 

14. Or gluttoning, etc. That is, either having a surplus of food 
or none at all. 

LXXVI 

Possibly referring to criticisms that had been made on his son- 
nets ; or it may be merely an apology to his friend for the monotony 
of them. Tyler, who assumes a possible allusion to the " rival poet " 
of 78-80 in this sonnet, thinks that in line 4 there may be a refer- 
ence to " the novel compound words employed by Chapman to 
express Homeric epithets." 

I. New pride. Novel poetical forms, etc. 

6. In a noted iveed. " In a dress by which it is always known, as 
those persons are who always wear the same colours" (Steevens). 
For weed, see on 2. 4 above ; and for noted, cf. K. John, iv. 2. 21 : 
"the antique and well noted face," etc. For invention, see on 
38. 8 above. For a comical Baconian comment on this passage, 
see Appendix under "The Sonnets and the Baconian Theory." 

7. Tell The quarto has " fel," and Lintott "fell; " corrected 
by Malone. That — so that ; as in 98. 4 below. 

8. Where. Capell conjectured " whence ; " but cf. Hen. V. iii. 
5. 15, A. and C. ii. 1. 18, etc. 

LXXVII 

" ' Probably,' says Steevens, ' this sonnet was designed to accom- 
pany a present of a book consisting of blank paper.' ' This con- 
jecture,' says Malone, ' appears to me extremely probable.' If I 
might hazard a conjecture, it would be that Shakspere, who had 
perhaps begun a new manuscript-book with Sonnet 75, and who, 
as I suppose, apologized for the monotony of his verses in 76, here 
ceased to write, knowing that his friend was favouring a rival, and 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 13 



1 94 Notes 

invited his friend to fill up the blank pages himself (see on 12 
below). Beauty, Time, and Verse formed the theme of many of 
Shakspere's sonnets ; now that he will write no more, he com- 
mends his friend to his glass, where he may discover the truth 
about his beauty; to the dial, where he may learn the progress 
of time ; and to this book, which he himself — not Shakspere — 
must fill. C. A. Brown and Henry Brown treat this sonnet as an 
Envoy' 1 '' (Dowden). That the sonnet refers to the present of a 
blank-book to his friend seems quite certain, but I cannot believe 
that it was partly filled with Shakespeare's poems. That the dial 
and mirror were also included in the gift is possible but not proba- 
ble — unless Thy in lines I and 2 should be " The," as in 3. The 
meaning may simply be that, while his friend's mirror and sun-dial 
may remind him that he is growing old, his memory is also liable to 
fail, and thoughts and feelings that he would secure from oblivion 
had better be committed to writing. 
4. This learning. That time flies. 

6. Mouthed graves. "All-devouring graves" (Malone). Cf. 
V. and A. 757: "What is thy body but a swallowing grave?" 

7. Shady stealth. That is, the stealthy motion of the shadow. 

8. Time's thievish progress. Cf. A. IV. ii. I. 169: "the thievish 
minutes," etc. 

9. Contain. Retain, as in M. of V.m. 1. 201, etc. 

10. Blanks. The quarto has "blacks;" corrected by Malone 
(the conjecture of Theobald and Capell). 

12. Dowden remarks : "Perhaps this is said with some feeling 
of wounded love — my verses have grown monotonous and weari- 
some ; write yourself, and you will find novelty in your own thoughts 
when once delivered from your brain and set down by your pen. 
Perhaps, also, ' this learning mayst thou taste ' (4) is suggested by 
the fact that S. is unlearned in comparison with the rival. I cannot 
bring you learning ; but set down your own thoughts, and you will 
find learning in them." For myself, I cannot see any allusion to 
the rival poet in this sonnet. 



Notes 195 



LXXVIII 

Here we have clear reference to a rival poet or poets. 

3. As every alien pen, etc. That every other poet has acquired 
my habit of writing to you. In the quarto alien is in italics and 
begins with a capital. See on 20. 8 above. 

4. Under thee. Under thy favour or patronage, or, perhaps, the 
hope of gaining it. Disperse — scatter abroad, or publish. 

6. Heavy ignorance. As Malone notes, the expression occurs 
again in Oth. ii. I. 144. Herford remarks that lines 5, 6 are "more 
naturally understood of S. himself than of the rival poet." 

7. The learned' s wing. Dyce compares Spenser, Teares of the 
Muses : — 

" Each idle wit at will presumes to make, 
And doth the learned's task upon him take." 

Learned favours the theory that Chapman was the poet. 

9. Compile. Compose, write ; the only sense in S. Cf. 85. 2 
below ; and see also L. L. L. iv. 3. 134, v. 2. 52, 896. 

10. Infliience. Inspiration ; as in L. L. L. v. 2, 869. Cf. 15. 4, 
where it is used in its literal and astrological sense. 

12. Arts. Learning, letters. Cf. 14. 10 and 66. 9 above. Tyler 
thinks that here " poetical style " is meant. 

13. Advance. Raise, lift up ; as often. 

LXXIX 

The subject of the rival poet is directly continued, I think ; but 
Dowden regards it as " a continuation of Sonn. 76."' 

5. Thy lovely argument. The argument or theme of your love- 
liness. See on ^8. 3 above. 

6. Travail. The ed. of 1640 has "travel." The two forms 
are used indiscriminately in the early eds. without regard to the 
meaning. 

7. Thy poet. The rival, of course. 



196 Notes 



13. Then thank him not, etc. Cf. what S. says of himself in 38. 5 
and elsewhere. 

LXXX 

The same subject is continued in this and the next sonnet. 

2. A better spirit. For the conjectures as to this better spirit, 
see p. 43 above. Spirit is monosyllabic, as often. Cf. 74. 8 above. 

7. My saucy bark, etc. Tyler quotes T. and C. i. 3. 35-45 and 
ii. 3. 277. On the passage, cf. 86. I. 

10. Sound/ess. Unfathomable. In the only other instance in S. 
(/. C. v. I. 36) it is = dumb. 

11. Wrack' 'd. The quarto has " wrackt." See on 65. 6 above. 

14. My love was my decay. That is, the cause of my being cast 
away ; because it was my love that prompted me to write. 

LXXXI 

1. Or. Either. Staunton conjectures " Whe'r" (= Whether). 
See on 59. 11 above. 

12. The breathers of this world. Those who are now living. 
Malone compares A. V. L. iii. 2. 297 : " I will chide no breather in 
the world but myself." Walker proposes to point as follows : — 

" shall o'er-read, 
And tongues to be your being shall rehearse ; 
When all the breathers of this world are dead, 
You still shall live," etc. ; 

but, as Dowden remarks, it is rare with S. to let the verse run on 

without a pause at the twelfth line of the sonnet. 

LXXXII 

The poet admits (perhaps in reply to something his friend had 
said) that he had no exclusive right to be his poetic eulogist. 

2. Attaint. Blame, discredit. Cf. the verb in 88. 7 below. 
Overlook = peruse ; as in M. N. D. ii. 2. 121, Lear, v. 1. 50, etc. 



Notes 197 



3. Dedicated words. Perhaps referring to an actual or proposed 
dedication of a book. 

5. Thou art as fair in knowledge as in hue. " S. had celebrated 
his friend's beauty (hue) ; perhaps his learned rival had celebrated 
the patron's knowledge ; such excellence reached ' a limit past the 
praise ' of Shakspere, who knew small Latin and less Greek " 
(Dowden). Tyler adds : " Subsequently, in the title to a sonnt t 
accompanying his translation of the Iliad, Chapman addressed 
Pembroke as ' the Learned and Most Noble Patron of Learning,' 
and the sonnet celebrates Pembroke's ' god-like learning.' " 

8. The time-bettering days. Cf. 32. 10 : " this growing age." 

10. Strained. Forced, overwrought. Surely, some of Shake- 
speare's laudation of his friend is sufficiently strained. 

11. Sympalhiz'd. Described sympathetically, or with true appre- 
ciation. Cf. R. of L. 1 1 13 : — 

" True sorrow then is feelingly suffic'd 
When with like semblance it is sympathiz'd." 

The meaning seems to be : thy nature, which is truly fair, needs no 
forced rhetoric to set it off, but is best described in the plain lan- 
guage of simple truth. 

LXXXIII 

The theme of 82 is continued. Mr. Samuel Neil {Life of S. 
1863), who believes that some of the Sonnets were addressed to 
Queen Elizabeth, mentions 83-86 and 106 as examples. 

2. Fair. Beauty. See on 16. 1 1 above. 

5. And therefore have I slept, etc. And therefore I have ceased 
to sound your praises. 

7. Modern. The word in S. regularly means " ordinary, com- 
monplace," and that is probably the sense here ; but Tyler takes it 
to be = more recent, and compares 82. 8. 

8. Grow. Probably = be, exist ; as in 84. 4 and often. Tyler 
thinks it may mean "grow as a poet contemplates," or "may 
allude to Mr. W. H.'s still immature youth." 



198 Notes 



What, Malone conjectured "that." 

12. Bring a tomb. Dowden compares 17. 3 above. 

LXXXIV 

The subject of the rival poet is continued in 84-86. 

3. In whose confine, etc. You are without a parallel and can be 
compared only with yourself. For store, cf. 14. 12. 

6. His. Its ; as in 9. 10, 14. 6, and 74. 7 above. 

8. Story. Most eds. put a comma after this word. I unhesitat- 
ingly retain the pointing of the quarto, which Dowden also thinks 
may be right. So = thus. 

11. Fame. Make famous. Elsewhere S. uses only the participle 
famed. 

14. Being fond on. Doting on. Cf. M. N. D. ii. 1. 266 : 
" More fond on her than she upon her love." See also the verb 
(though Schmidt thinks it may as well be the adjective) in T. N. 
ii. 2. 35 : — 

" my master loves her dearly; 
And I, poor monster, fond as much on him." 

^ LXXXV 

1. Tongue-tied Muse. Cf. 80. 4 above. 

2. CompiPd. See on 78. 9 above. 

3. Reserve their character. Probably corrupt. The Cambridge 
ed. records (and Tyler adopts) the plausible anonymous conjec- 
ture, " Rehearse thy" (or "your"). Dowden suggests "Deserve 
their character" ( = deserve to be written). Malone makes 
reserve = preserve (cf. 32. 7 above), but does not tell us what 
" preserve their character " can mean here. 

4. FiVd. Polished (as with a file). Cf. L. L. L. v. 1. 12 : "his 
tongue filed." See also on 86. 13 below. 

6. Unlettered. Since the clerk, whether lettered or unlettered, 
responds Amen, the word must have some special significance. 
The meaning may be that he endorses the eulogies with as little 



Notes 



199 



hesitation as the clerk does the Latin to which he cries Amen, 
though he may not understand it. 
1 1 . But that. That is, what I add. 

LXXXVI 

1. Proud full sail. Cf. 80. 6 above. As Minto notes, this suits 
well the grand fourteen-syllable lines of Chapman's Iliad. Fleay, 
who believes that Nash was the rival poet, sees here an " ironical 
reference to a prosaic sonnet by Nash in Prince Pennilesse, accom- 
panying a complaint that Amyntas's (Southampton's?) name is omit- 
ted in the Sonnet Catalogue of English heroes appended to Spenser's 
F. Q." Nash uses the words " full sail " in that connection. 

Furnivall remarks : " ' The proud full sail of his great verse ' 
probably alludes to the swelling hexameters of Chapman's english- 
ing of Homer. ' His spirit, by spirits taught to write,' may well 
refer to Chapman's claim that Homer's spirit inspired him, a claim 
made, no doubt, in words, before its appearance in print in his 
Tears of Peace, 1609 : — 

' I am, said he [Homer], that spirit Ely sian, 

That . . . did thy bos om fill 

With such a flood of soul, that thou wert fain, 

With exclamations of her rapture then, 

To vent it to the echoes of the vale, . . . 

. . .and thou didst i?iherit 

My true sense, for the time then, in my spirit ; 

And 1 invisibly went prompting thee.' . . . 
See, too, on Shakspere's sneer at his rival's ' affable familiar ghost, 
which nightly gulls him with intelligence,' Chapman's Dedication 
to his Shadow of Night (1594), p. 3, 'not without having drops of 
their souls like an awaked fa??iiliarj and in his Tears of Peace : — 
' Still being persuaded by the shameless night, 

That all my reading, writing, all my pains, 

Are serious trifles, and the idle veins 

Of an unthrifty angel that deludes 

My simple fancy '..' . . . 



200 Notes 

These make a better case for Chapman being the rival than has 
been made for any one else." 

Dowden says: "No Elizabethan poet wrote ampler verse, none 
scorned ' ignorance ' more, or more haughtily asserted his learning 
than Chapman. In The Tears of Peace (1609), Homer as a spirit 
visits and inspires him ; the claim to such inspiration may have 
been often made by the translator of Homer in earlier years. 
Chapman was preeminently the poet of Night. The. Shadow of 
Night, with the motto ' Versus mei habebunt aliquantum Noctis,' 
appeared in 1594; the title page describes it as containing ' two 
poeticall Hy??mes.'' In the dedication Chapman assails unlearned 
' passion-driven men,' ' hide-bound with affection to great men's 
fancies,' and ridicules the alleged eternity of their ' idolatrous platts 
for riches.' ' Now what a supererogation in wit this is, to think 
Skill so mightily pierced with their loves, that she should prosti- 
tutely show them her secrets, when she will scarcely be looked 
upon by others, but with invocation, fasting, watching.' Of Chap- 
man's Homer a part appeared in 1596; dedicatory sonnets in a 
later edition are addressed to both Southampton and Pembroke." 

3. Inhearse. Enclose as in a coffin ; found again in I Hen. VI. 
iv. 7. 45- 

4. Making their tomb the womb, etc. Malone compares R. and 
J. ii. 3. 9 : — 

" The earth that 's nature's mother is her tomb ; 
What is her burying grave, that is her womb." 

See also Per. ii. 3. 45 : — 

" Whereby I see that Time 's the king of men : 
He 's both their parent and he is their grave ; " 

and Milton, P. L. ii. 911 : "The womb of nature, and perhaps her 
grave." We find the same thought in Lucretius, v. 259 : " Omni- 
parens eadem rerum commune sepulcrum." 

8. Astonished. Stunned as by a thunderstroke. Cf. R. of L. 
1730 : "Stone-still, astonish'd with this deadly deed," etc. 



Notes 201 

13. FilVd up his line. Malone, Steevens, and Dyce read " fil'd," 
etc. Steevens cites Jonson, Verses on Shakespeare : "Inhiswell- 
torned and true-filed lines." But, as Dowden notes, JilVd up his 
line is opposed to then lacked I matter. The quarto has " hid," as 
in 17. 2 and 63. 3 ; while it has "fil'd" in 85. 4. 

14. Lack' d I matter. Cf. T. and C. ii. 3. 103 : "Then will Ajax 
lack matter." 

LXXXVII 

" Increasing coldness on his friend's part brings S. to the point 
of declaring that all is over between them. This sonnet in form is 
distinguished by double-rhymes throughout" (Dowden) ; but this 
is not true of lines 2 and 4. 

4. Determinate. " Determined, ended, out of date. The term 
is used in legal conveyances" (Malone). Cf. Rich. II. i. 3. 150. 
See also the noun in Sonn. 13. 6. Schmidt explains the word as 
= "limited ; " as in T. IV. ii. 1. II : "my determinate voyage is 
mere extravagancy." 

6. Riches. Singular ; as the word originally and properly was 
(Fr. richesse). Cf. alms ; a true singular, as S. makes it. 

8. Patent. Privilege ; the charter of 3 above. Cf. M. N. D.\. 
1. 80 : "my virgin patent ; " A. W. iv. 5. 69 : "a patent for his 
sauciness," etc. 

11. Misprision. Mistake, error. Cf. Much Ado, iv. I. 187 : 
" There is some strange misprision in the princes," etc. For grow- 
ing, see on 83. 8 above. 

14. No such matter. Nothing of the kind. Cf. Much Ado, ii. 3. 
225 : " the sport will be when they hold one an opinion of another's 
dotage, and no such matter," etc. 

LXXXVIII 

A continuation of 87, as 89 and 90 also are. 

1. Set me light. Set light by me, esteem me lightly. Cf. 
Rich. II. ii. 3. 293 : "The man that mocks at it and sets it light." 



202 Notes 

3. Against myself. Cf. 149. 2. 

4. Forsworn. As virtually pledged to lasting friendship. 

7. Attainted. See on 82. 2 above. 

8. Shalt. The quarto has " shall ; " corrected by Sewell. That 
— so that ; as in 76. 7, etc. 

12. Double-vantage. The hyphen was inserted by Malone. The 
meaning seems to be that any benefit he can do to himself, though 
it be to his own injury, he counts as a double gain. 

LXXXIX 

2. Comment. Enlarge, expatiate. 

3. My lameness. See on 37. 3 above. 

6. To set a form, etc. By giving a good semblance to the 
change which you desire ; the " indefinite " infinitive. Palgrave 
makes it = " by defining the change you desire." Dowden com- 
pares M. N. D.'\. 1. 233. 

8. / will acquaintance strangle. " I will put an end to our 
familiarity" (Malone). Cf. T. N. v. 1. 150 : "That makes thee 
strangle thy propriety" (disavow thy personality) ; A. and C. ii. 6. 
*3Q: " the band that seems to tie their friendship together will be 
the very strangler of their amity." Malone calls strangle " un- 
couth ; " but, as Knight asks, " why is any word called uncouth 
which expresses a meaning more clearly and forcibly than any 
other word ? The miserable affectation of the last age, in reject- 
ing words that in sound appeared not to harmonize with the min- 
cing prettiness of polite conversation, emasculated our language ; 
and it will take some time to restore it to its ancient nervousness." 
For look strange, cf. C. of E. v. I. 295 : " Why look you strange on 
me ? " 

13. Debate. Contest, quarrel ; the only meaning in S. Cf. 
M. N. D. ii. I. 116 : — 

"And this same progeny of evils comes 
From our debate, from our dissension," 



Notes 20 J 



xc 

6. 7%* rearward, etc. Cf. ^/«c^ .4</<?, iv. i . 128: — 

" Thought I thy spirits were stronger than thy shames, 
Myself would, on the rearward of reproaches, 
Strike at thy life." 

7. Give not a windy night, etc. Referring to the fact that wind 
often precedes rain. Cf. T. and C. iv. 4. 55, R. of I. 1788, etc. 

13. Strains of woe. Dowden quotes Much Ado, v. I. 12 : — 
" Measure his woe the length and breadth of mine, 
And let it answer every strain for strain." 

XCI 

The beginning of a new group, including 92-96. 

3. New-fangled ill. Fashionable but ugly. Cf. L. I. L. i. I. 106 
and A. Y. L. iv. I. 152. 

4. Horse. A contracted plural (as line 1 1 indicates) ; as in 
Macb.'w. 1. 140, T. of S. ind. 1. 61, etc. Cf. sense in 112. 10 below. 

9. Better. The quarto has " bitter ; " corrected in the ed. of 
1640. 

XCII 

10. On thy revolt doth lie. Hangs upon thy faithlessness. Cf. 
Oth. iii. 3. 188 : "The smallest doubt or fear of her revolt," etc. 

13. Blessed-fair. Hyphened by Malone. 

XCIII 

3. New. To something new or different ; that is, aversion or 
hate. 

7. In many's looks. Cf. R. and J. i. 3. 91 : "in many's eyes" 
(omitted by Schmidt). On the passage, cf. Macb. i. 4. 11, i. 7. 83. 

11. Whatever, The quarto has "what ere;" corrected by 
Gildon. 



204 Notes 



xciv 

" In 93 Shakspere has described his friend as able to show a 
sweet face while harbouring false thoughts ; the subject is enlarged 
on in the present sonnet. They who can hold their passions in 
check, who can seem loving yet keep a cool heart, who move pas- 
sion in others, yet are cold and unmoved themselves — they rightly 
inherit from heaven large gifts, for they husband them ; whereas 
passionate intemperate natures squander their endowments ; those 
who can assume this or that semblance as they see reason are the 
masters and owners of their faces ; others have no property in such 
excellences as they possess, but hold them for the advantage of the 
prudent self-contained persons. True, these self-contained persons 
may seem to lack generosity ; but, then, without making voluntary 
gifts they give inevitably, even as the summer's flower is sweet to 
the summer, though it live and die only to itself. Yet, let such an 
one beware of corruption, which makes odious the sweetest flowers " 
(Dowden). 

2-8. That do not, etc. Tyler compares what Hamlet says to 
Horatio (hi. 2. 70-76) : — 

" Thou hast been 
As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing," etc. 

For the corruption of such a character, Tyler refers to Angelo in 
M. for M. 

4. Cold. The quarto has " could ; " corrected in the ed. of 1640. 

6. Expense. Expenditure, waste. Cf. 129. 1 below. 

8. Stewards. " And so responsible ; not lords and owners, hav- 
ing absolute possession" (Verity). 

II. Base. Staunton conjectures "foul," and Walker "barest" 
for basest in the next line ; but I see no necessity for either change. 
Base is used very often by S. in the general sense of mean, bad, vile, 
etc. Cf. 33. 5, 34. 3, 74. 12, 141. 6, etc. 

14. Lilies, etc. This line is found also in Edw. III. ii. I, the 
passage being as follows : — 



Notes 205 



" A spacious field of reasons could I urge 
Between his glory, daughter, and thy shame : 
That poison shows worst in a golden cup ; 
Dark night seems darker by the lightning flash ; 
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds ; 
And every glory, that inclines to sin, 
The same is treble by the opposite." 

The scene is one that some critics ascribe to S. The play was 
first printed in 1596. See also on 142. 6 below. Fester — rot ; 
as in Hen. V. iv. 3. 88 and R. and J. iv. 3. 43. On the pas- 
sage, cf. 69. 12. 

Dowden compares with this sonnet T. N. iii. 4. 399 fol. : " But 
O how vile an idol," etc. 



xcv 

Continues 94, as 96 also does. 
2. Canker. See on 35. 4 above. 

6. Sport. Sensuality, licentiousness ; as in M. for M. iii. 2. 127, 
Oth. ii. 1. 230, etc. Cf. sportive in 121. 6. 

8. Naming thy name, etc. Steevens compares A. and C. ii. 2. 

243 = — 

" for vilest things 
Become themselves in her, that the holy priests 
Bless her when she is riggish." 

12. Turn. The quarto has " turnes ; " corrected by Sewell. 
On the passage, cf. 40. 13. 

XCVI 

2. Gentle sport. Cf. 95. 6 above. Gentle may mean "gentle- 
manly ; " that is, as some say, or call it. 

3. More and less. High and low ; as in 1 Hen. IV. iv. 3. 68 : 
" The more and less came in with cap and knee." 



2o6 Notes 

6. Basest. See on 94. 1 1 above. 

10. If like a lamb, etc. " If he could change his natural look, 
and assume the innocent visage of a lamb " (Malone). As Dowden 
notes, the thought of 9, 10 is expressed in different imagery in 93. 
For translate = transform, cf. Ham. iii. 1. 113 : "translate beauty 
into his likeness." 

12. The strength of all thy state. " Used periphrastically, and = 
all thy strength" (Schmidt). Dowden makes state = "majesty, 
splendour," and Tyler " noble beauty." 

13, 14. The same couplet closes Sonn. 36. See p. 13 above. 

XCVII 

Sonnets 96-99 seem unconnected with those preceding and follow- 
ing. I doubt whether they have anything to do with " Mr. W. H." 
or are addressed to a man. See p. 13 above. Since the Introduc- 
tion was written I see that Hudson {Life, Art, and Characters of S.) 
declares his belief that Sonn. 97-99, also those punning on the 
name of Will, together with 109-117, were addressed to Anne 
Hathaway. He is satisfied that when S. wrote these sonnets, " his 
thoughts were travelling home to the bride of his youth and mother 
of his children." 

5. This time removed. "This time in which I was remote or 
absent from thee" (Malone). Cf. T. N. v. 1. 92: "a twenty 
years removed thing." 

6. The teeming autumn, etc. Malone compares M. N. D. ii. I, 
112 : "The childing autumn," etc. 

7. Prime. Spring ; as in R. of L. 332 : " To add a more re- 
joicing to the prime." 

10. Hope of orphans. Probably = hope of posthumous offspring, 
as Tyler makes it. 

13. Cheer. Face, countenance ; its original sense ; as in M. N. D. 
iii. 2. 96: "pale of cheer," etc, Schmidt puts it under cheer — 
" cheerfulness," 



Notes 207 



XCVIII 

2. Proud-pied April. April in its richly variegated apparel. For 
pied, cf. L. L. L. v. 2. 904 : " daisies pied," etc. On the passage, 
cf. K. and J. i. 2. 27 : — 

" Such comfort as do lusty young men feel 
When well-appareli'd April on the heel 
Of limping winter treads." 

5. refers to April oftener than to any other month ; both for 
its flowers and vernal beauty, and for its uncertain and showery 
weather. For allusions in the Sonnets, cf. 3. 10, 21. 7, and 104. 7. 
May, however, is a " close second." March comes next (12 times), 
but only on account of the "Ides of March" in/. C, where 10 of 
the passages occur. December i.s mentioned 7 times, Jtme <\,July 3, 
January and August twice, and February once ; the other three 
months not at all. 

4. That. So that ; as in 76. 7 above. Heavy Saturn — 
" the gloomy side of nature ; or the saturnine spirit in life " 
(Palgrave). 

6. Different flowers in, etc. That is, flowers different in, etc. 
Cf. 44. 6 above. 

7. Summer 's story. Malone remarks : " By a summer 's story S. 
seems to have meant some gay flction. Thus his comedy founded 
on the adventures of the king and queen of the fairies, he calls a 
Midsummer Night's Dream. On the other hand, in W. T. he tells 
us ' a sad tale's best for winter, ,' So also in Cymb. iii. 4. 12 : — 

' If 't be summer news, 
Smile to 't before ; if winterly, thou need'st 
But keep that countenance still.' " 
Dowden asks : " But is not A Midsummer •- Night' 's Dream so 
named because on Midsummer Eve men's dreams ran riot, ghosts 
were visible, maidens practised divination for husbands, and 'mid- 
summer madness' ( T. A T . iii. 4. 61) reached its height ?" Here, 
however, as summer's story is immediately connected with the men- 



208 Notes 

tion of spring and April above, we should expect "springtime 
story," or its equivalent. 

9. Lily's. The quarto has " lillies," which was probably meant 
to be the possessive ; but Malone, Tyler, and others retain it as the 
objective plural. Lily's white seems more in keeping with vermil- 
ion in the rose ; but the question is a close one after all, as often 
in choosing between possible interpretations of the Sonnets. 

II. They were but sweet, etc. "The poet refuses to enlarge on 
the beauty of the flowers, declaring that they are only sweet, only 
delightful, so far as they resemble his friend" (Steevens). Malone 
would read " They were, my sweet," etc. Lettsom proposes " They 
were but fleeting figures of delight." These are only impertinent 
meddlings with the original text. 

XCIX 

This sonnet has fifteen lines, like one of the sonnets in Barnes's 
Parthenophil and Parthenophe, as Dowden notes. 

3. Purple. Red. The word is often used loosely, like the Latin 
purpureus. 

6. Condemned for thy hand. Condemned for stealing the 
whiteness of thy hand. 

7. And buds of marjoram, etc. Dowden compares Suckling's 
Tragedy of Brennoralt, iv. 1 : — 

" Hair curling, and cover'd like buds of marjoram ; 
Part tied in negligence, part loosely flowing." 

He adds : " Mr. H. C. Hart tells me that buds of marjoram are 
dark purple-red before they open, and afterwards pink ; dark 
auburn I suppose would be the nearest approach to marjoram in 
the colour of hair. Mr. Hart suggests that the marjoram has stolen 
not colour but perfume from the young man's hair. Gervase Mark- 
ham gives sweet marjoram as an ingredient in 'The water of sweet 
smells,' and Culpepper says ' marjoram is much used in all odor- . 
iferous waters.' Cole {Adam in Eden, ed. 1657) says ' Marjerome 



Notes 209 



is a chief ingredient in most of those powders that Barbers use, in 
whose shops I have seen great store of this herb hung up.' " 

8. On thorns did stand. A quibbling allusion to the proverbial 
expression, " to stand on thorns." Cf. W. T. iv. 4. 596 : " But O 
the thorns we stand upon ! " 

9. One. The quarto has " Our ; " corrected by Sewell. For 
blushing, cf. E. of L. 479. 

13. Canker. See on 35. 4 above. 

15. Sweet. Walker conjectures " scent." 



An invocation to the Muse, written after a suspension of sonnet- 
writing. 

3. Fury. Poetic enthusiasm or inspiration. Cf. L. L. L. iv. 3. 
229 : "what fury hath inspir'd thee now? " So we have " prophetic 
fury " in Oth. iii. 4. 72. See also " poet's rage "in 1 7. 1 1 above, 
and the "fine frenzy" of M. N. D. v. 1. 12. 

4. Darkening. Sullying, degrading. 

9. Resty. Too fond of rest, lazy, torpid ; as in Cymb. iii. 6. 34 : 
" resty sloth," etc. Dyce quotes Coles, Latin Diet. : " Resty, piger, 
lentus." 

11. Satire. Satirist. Walker quotes Jonson, Masque of Time 
Vindicated : " 'T is Chronomastix, the brave satyr; " Poetaster, v. 
I: "The honest satyr hath the happiest soul" [satyr and satire 
were used interchangeably in this sense] ; Goffe, Courageous 
Turk, ii. 3 : — 

" Poor men may love, and none their wills correct, 
But all turn satires of a king's affect ; " 

Shirley, Witty Fair One, i. 3: "prithee, Satire, choose another 
walk," etc. Tyler paraphrases thus : " Cause decay to be disre- 
garded and contemned, by conferring eternal fame." 

14. So thou prevent st, etc. " So by anticipation thou hinderest 
the destructive effects of his weapons" (Steevens). 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 14 



2io Notes 



ci 

A continuation of the address to the Muse. 

3. Truth and beauty. Cf. 14. II, 14, 54. I, 2, Phoenix and Ttir- 
tle, 64, etc. 

6. His colour. That of my friend. 

7. Lay. That is, lay on, like a painter's colours. Cf. T. N. i. 5. 

258:- 

" 'T is beauty truly blent, whose red and white 
Nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on." 

11. Him. Changed to " her " in the ed. of 1640 ; as him and he 
in 14 to "her" and "she." 

CII 

Here the poet excuses his temporary silence, and continues the 
subject in 103. 

3. That love is merchandized, etc. That is, it is degraded by 
being treated as a "thing of sale." See on 21. 14 above ; and cf. 
L. L. L. ii. 1. 13: — 

" my beauty, though but mean, 
Needs not the painted flourish of your praise : 
Beauty is bought by judgment of the eye, 
Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues." 

7. In summer's front. In the beginning of summer. Qi.W.T. 
iv. 4'. 3 : " Peering in April's front." 

8. Her pipe. The quarto has "his pipe ; " corrected by Hous- 
man {Coll. of Eng. Sonnets, 1835). Tyler retains "his," though 
he refers to the her in 10. 

9. Not that the summer, etc. Capell quotes M. of V.\. 1 . 104 : — 

"The nightingale, if she should sing by day, 
When every goose is cackling, would be thought 
No better a musician then the wren." 

12. Sweets grown common, etc. Cf. 52. 3, 4. See also T. N. i. 
1.8: " 'T is not so sweet now as it was before." 



Notes an 



cm 



1. Poverty. The abstract for the concrete. 

2. Her pride. The power of which she is proud. 

3. The argument all bare. The mere theme of my verse. 

7. Blunt. Dull, clumsy. 

8. Dulling my lines. Proving them inadequate. 

9. Striving to mend, etc. Cf. Lear, i. 4. 369 : " Striving to bet- 
ter, oft we mar what 's well." 

11. Pass. Issue, result; but not a figure from fencing, as has 
been suggested. 

CIV 

The poet has now seen his friend, and refers to the three years 
since they first became acquainted. 

3. Winters. Dyce reads " winters'," which may be right, though 
the plural verb is rather in favour of the text. 

4. Summer? pride. Steevens cites R. and J. i. 2. 10 : " Let two 
more summers wither in their pride." 

10. Steal from his figure. Creep away from the figure on the 
dial. Cf. 77. 7 above. The reference here seems to be to a clock, 
not to a sun-dial. 

CV 

"To the beauty praised in 100, and the truth and beauty in 101, 
S. now adds a third perfection, kindness ; and these three sum up 
the perfections of his friend" (Dowden). 

1. Let not my love, etc. " Because the continual repetition of the 
same praises seemed like a form of worship" (Walker). Cf. 108. 
1-8. 

8. Leaves out difference. Omits reference to other qualities. 

9. Fair, kind, and true. Cf. M. of V. \\. 6. 53 fol. 

14. Never kept seat, Gildon reads " never sate," and Sewell 
"have never sate " 



2ia Notes 



cvi 

Loosely connected with the preceding sonnet. 

1. Chronicle. Hales (quoted by Dowden) asks : " What chroni- 
cle is he thinking of? The Faerie Queene?" The chronicle of 
wasted time may be simply = the history of the past. 

2. Wights. Persons. The word is seldom used by S. except for 
the sake of rhyme, as here and in L. L. L. i. I. 178 ; or in the style 
of the old ballads, as in Oth. ii. 1. 159, ii. 3. 96, etc. He puts it 
also into the mouth of Pistol {M. W. i. 3. 23, 40, Hen. V. ii. 1. 64). 
In T. and C. iv. 2. 12 it is feminine. 

7. Antique. For the accent, see on 19. 10 and 59. 7. 

8. Master. Possess, control ; as in Hen. V. ii. 4. 137: "these 
he masters now," etc. 

9. Dowden compares Constable's Diana : — 

" Miracle of the world, I never will deny 
That former poets praise the beauty of their days ; 
But all those beauties were but figures of thy praise, 
And all those poets did of thee but prophesy." 

11. And, for they looked. And because they looked. See on 54. 
9 above. With divining eyes ; that is, only guessing at what was 
to come. 

12. Skill. The quarto has "still; " corrected by Malone (the 
conjecture of Tyrwhitt and Capell). 

CVII 

"Continues the celebration of his friend, and rejoices in their 
restored affection. Mr. Massey explains this sonnet as a song of 
triumph for the death of Elizabeth, and the deliverance of South- 
ampton from the Tower. Elizabeth (Cynthia) is the eclipsed mor- 
tal moon of line 5 ; cf. A. and C. iii. 13. 153 : — 

' Alack, our terrene moon [Cleopatra] 
Is now eclips'd.' 



Notes 213 

But an earlier reference to a moon-eclipse (35. 3) has to do with 
his friend, not with Elizabeth, and in the present sonnet the moon 
is imagined as having endured her eclipse, and come out none the 
less bright. I interpret (as Mr. Simpson does, in his Philosophy of 
Shakspere's Sonnets, p. 79) : ' Not my own fears (that my friend's 
beauty may be on the wane) (see 104. 9-14) nor the prophetic soul 
of the world, prophesying in the persons of dead knights and ladies 
your perfections (see 106), and so prefiguring your death, can con- 
fine my lease of love to a brief term of years. Darkness and fears 
are past, the augurs of ill find their predictions falsified, doubts are 
over, peace has come in place of strife ; the love in my heart is 
fresh and young (see 108. 9), and I have conquered Death, for in 
this verse we both shall find life in the memories of men ' " (Dow- 
den). If the moon is Elizabeth (which is probable) the reference 
may be to the Rebellion of Essex. 

I. Prophetic soul. Cf. Ham. i. 5. 40 : " O, my prophetic soul ! " 

4. Suppos 'd as forfeit, etc. Supposed to be a limited lease. 
Confined. For the accent, see on ^. 7. For the ordinary accent, 

cf. 105. 7 and no. 12. 

5. Eclipse. See on 60. 7 above. 

6. Mock their own presage. " Laugh at the futility of their own 
predictions " (Steevens) . 

7. Incertainties. Cf. 115. II below, and W. T. iii. 2. 170. 
These are the only instances of the word in S., and uncertainty 
also occurs three times. 

8. And peace proclaims, etc. " The peace completed early in 
1609, which ended the war between Spain and the United Prov- 
inces, might answer to the tone of this sonnet" (Palgrave). Of 
endless age = to last indefinitely. 

9. This most balmy time. Apparently alluding to the weather 
at the time when he writes. 

10. My love looks fresh. Dowden is doubtful whether this means 
" the love in my heart," or " my love " = my friend. On the whole, 
the former seems the more probable. Cf. 104. 8 and 108. 9. 



214 Notes 



Subscribes. Yields, submits. Cf. T. of S. i. I. 81, etc. 
1 2. Insults o'er, etc. Exults or triumphs over the hosts of the 
vulgar dead. Cf. 3 Hen. VI. i. 3. 14: "insulting o'er his prey." 

CVIII 

The poet's verse has but one theme, and has not that been 
exhausted? Cf. Sonn. 86, where the answer is similar. 

3. New to register. The quarto has " now " for new ; corrected 
by Malone. Walker would read " What 's now to speak, what 
now," etc. 

5. Sweet boy. The ed. of 1640 has " sweet -love." Prayers 
divine ; that is, to God, as in a ritual. 

9. love's fresh case. " Love's new condition and circumstances, 
the new youth of love spoken of in 107. 10" (Dowden). Malone 
takes it to be a reference to the poet's own compositions. Verity 
thinks the meaning is : " In the case of love which is ever fresh." 
Tyler explains thus: "Though a change may have occurred in the 
appearance of the beloved one, placing the lover consequently in a 
' fresh case,' a new position." It is a close question between the 
possible interpretations. 

12. Antiquity. The past (of their friendship). 

13, 14. Finding, etc. "Finding the first conception of love — 
that is, love as passionate as at first — excited by one whose years 
and outward form show the effects of age" (Dowden). "The first 
conceit of love is still produced, where, to the ordinary eye, the 
power to charm is gone" (Tyler). 

CIX 

This sonnet seems to refer to scandalous reports concerning the 
poet's life during the absence from his friend. 

2. Qualify. Temper, moderate. Cf. R. of L. 424: — 
" His rage of lust by gazing qualified ; 
Slack'd, not suppress'd," etc. 



Notes 215 

4. In thy breast. Cf. L. L. L. v. 2. 826: " Hence ever then my 
heart is in thy breast." See also A. K Z. v. 4. 121, Rich. III. i. 1. 
204, etc. 

5. My home of love, etc. Malone compares M. N. D. iii. 2. 
170: — 

" My heart to her but as guest-wise sojourn'd, 
And now to Helen is it home return'd." 

Ranged = gone astray, been inconstant. Cf. T. of S. iii. I. 91. 

7. Just to the time, etc. " Punctual to the time, not altered with 
the time " (Dowden) ; the only instance of this sense of exchanged 
in S. 

11. Stairtd. Staunton conjectures "strain'd." 

14. My rose. Cf. 1.2 above for the figure ; but here it is some- 
what peculiarly applied to the person addressed, if that person is a 
man. Is it certain that this sonnet and the next are to a man? It 
has been generally understood as referring to the poet's life as a 
player ; but this is somewhat doubtful. 

CX 

A continuation of 109, as 1 1 1 probably is. 

2. Motley. A wearer of motley, that is, a fool or jester. Cf. 
A. Y. I. iii. 3. 79. 

3. Gor^d mine own thoughts. That is, done violence to them. 
Cf. T. and C. iii. 3. 228 : " My fame is shrewdly gor'd," etc. 

4. Made old offences, etc. " Entered into new friendships and 
loves which were transgressions against my old love" (Dowden). 
Verity explains thus : " prostituted my love — a love so new, so 
unknown to other men, so rare — to the old hackneyed purposes 
and commonplaces of the stage, made capital out of my emotions, 
turned my passion to account, sold cheap what is most dear — all 
this being done in his capacity as actor." 

6. Strangely. Distantly, mistrustfully. Cf. 49. 5 above. 

7. Blenches. Startings-aside, aberrations ; the only instance of 



216 Notes 

the noun in S. Cf. the verb in W. T. i. 2. 333, T. and C. ii. 2. 68, 
M.forM. iv. 5. 5, etc. 

9. Have what shall have no end. Malone reads " save what " 
(the conjecture of Tyrwhitt) ; but what shall have no end = my 
lasting love for you. 

10. Grind, etc. Whet by newer attachments. 

12. A god in love, etc. "This line seems to be a reminiscence 
of the thoughts expressed in 105, and to refer to the First Com- 
mandment" (Dowden); but I doubt whether there is such a 
reference. 

13, 14. Then give me welcome, etc. It is difficult to believe that 
this is addressed to a man. 

CXI 

This sonnet may possibly refer to his life as actor, even if 1 10 
does not. 

1. With. The quarto has "wish; " corrected by Gildon. For 
chide with, cf. Cymb. v. 4. 32, Oth. iv. 2. 167, etc. 

2. Harmful. The ed. of 1640 has "harmlesse." 
8. Renewed. Made new, completely changed. 
10. Eisel. Vinegar. Skelton says of Jesus : — 

" He drank eisel and gall 
To redeeme us withal." 

Cf. Ham. v. I. 299, where the use of the word (if it be the same) 
has been much disputed. 

12. To correct correction. "To complete and perfect the cor- 
rection of my conduct" (Tyler). 

CXII 

Apparently connected with ill. 

4. Cer-green. Sewell reads " o'er-skreen," and Steevens con- 
jectures " o'er-grieve." The meaning is clear, though the expres- 



Notes 217 



sion is peculiar, if not corrupt. Allow = approve ; as in Lear, ii. 

4. 194: — 

" O heavens, 
If you do love old men, if your sweet sway 
Allow obedience." 

Cf. Psalms, xi. 6 (Prayer-Book version) : "The Lord alloweth the 
righteous." 

5. Must strive. Must endeavour to bear. 

7. None else, etc. " No one living for me except you, nor I 
alive to any, who can change my feelings fixed as steel either for 
good or ill — either to pleasure or pain" (Dowden). Malone con- 
jectures "e'er changes," and Knight "so changes." Dyce prints 
" sense'," both here and in 10 below. In the latter case it is quite 
certainly the contracted plural (see on 91. 4 above), and perhaps 
here also. 

8. Right or wrong. " Either to what is right or to what is 
wrong" (Steevens). 

9. Abysm. Printed " Abisme" in the quarto. See on 20. 7 
above. 

10. Adder -1 s sense. For other allusions to the proverbial deafness 
of the adder, see 2 Hen. VI. iii. 2. 76 and T. and C. ii. 2. 172. 

11. Critic. Carper ; the only meaning in S. Cf. L. L. L. iii. 1. 
178 and T. and C. v. 2. 131 ; the only other instances in his works. 

12. With . . . dispense. Excuse. Cf. C. of E. ii. I. 103, etc. 

13. So strongly, etc. "So kept and harbour'd in my thoughts" 
(Schmidt). 

14. Are dead. The quarto has " y' are ; " corrected by Malone 
(1780). Dyce and Dowden read "they're." 

CXIII 

This sonnet resumes the idea that the image of his friend is 
found in everything, even what is deformed and monstrous. 
I. My eye is in my mind. Cf. 47. 7, 8, 



2i 8 Notes 

3. Part his function. Divide its function. Hudson makes part 
== " depart from, forsake ; " but partly confirms the other explana- 
tion. 

6. Latch. Catch. Cf. Macb. iv. 3. 195 : " Where hearing should 
not latch them," etc. The quarto has " lack ; " corrected by Malone. 

7. Quick. Quickly appearing or passing ; or " perceived as the 
eye quickly moves" (Tyler). 

10. Favour. Countenance, aspect. Cf. 125. 5 below. See also 
Proverbs, xxxi. 30. 

14. Makes mine eye untrue. The quarto reads "maketh mine 
untrue," which Malone explains thus : " The sincerity of my affec- 
tion is the cause of my untruth, that is, my not seeing objects truly, 
such as they appear to the rest of mankind " ; and White as fol- 
lows ; " maketh the semblance, the fictitious (and so the false or 
untrue) object which is constantly before me." On the whole, I 
prefer the reading in the text, which occurred independently to 
Capell and Malone. Collier suggests " maketh my eyne untrue," 
and Lettsom " mak'th mine eye untrue." 

CXIV 

"Continues the subject treated in 113, and inquires why and 
how it is that his eye gives a false report of objects" (Dowden). 

4. Alchemy. Printed " Alcumie " in the quarto. See on 20. 7 
above. For the allusion to alchemy, cf. 33. 4. S. uses the word 
only in these passages and in J. C. i. 3. 159. Alchemist occurs in 
K.John, hi. 1. 78 and T. of A. v. I. 117. 

5. Indigest. Chaotic, formless. Cf. 2 Hen. VI. v. I. 157: "foul 
indigested lump;" and 3 Hen. VI. v. 6. 51: "an indigested and 
deformed lump." These are the only instances of the words in S. 

6. Cherubins. The only form of the plural in S., as cherubin is 
the only singular, except in Ham. iv. 3. 50, where cherub occurs. 

9. ' T is flattery in my seeing. Dowden quotes T. N. i. 5. 238 : — ■ 
" I do I know not what, and fear to find 
Mine eye too great a flatterer for my mind." 



Notes 119 



II. What tvitk his gust is greeing. What suits its (the eye's) 
taste. The quarto has greeing, not " 'greeing," as commonly printed. 
Gree is found in prose ; as in M. of V. ii. 2. 108, etc. For gust, cf. 
T. N. i. 3. 2iZ '• " tne g ust he hath in quarrelling," etc. 

13, 14. As Steevens remarks, the allusion is here to the tasters 
to princes, whose office it was to taste and declare the good quality 
of dishes and liquors served up. Cf. K. John, v. 6. 28 : " Who 
did taste to him ? " 

cxv 

The poet declares that he was wrong when he said that his love 
could not be greater. It grows stronger and stronger. 

8. Divert strong minds, etc. Tyler compares Ham. iii. 2. 210 
fol. 

11. Certain o'er incertainty, etc. Cf. 107. 7 above. 

13. Might I not say so. I ought not to have said so. 

CXVI 

This fine sonnet may or may not belong in the group addressed 
to Mr. W. H. — probably not. 

2. Impediments. Alluding to the Marriage Service : " If either 
of you know any impediment," etc. 

love is not love, etc. Steevens quotes lear, i. 1. 241 : — 

" Love 's not love 
When it is mingled with regards that stand 
Aloof from the entire point." 

3. Alteration. That is, in the loved one. 

4. Or bends, etc. Or changes with absence. 

5. An ever-fixed mark, etc. Malone cites Cor. v. 3. 74 : " Like 
a great sea-mark standing every flaw." See also Oth. v. 2. 268 : 
" And very sea-mark of my utmost sail." 

8. Whose worth 's unknown, etc. Apparently, whose stellar 
influence is unknown, although its angular altitude has been de- 



220 Notes 

termined (Palgrave) ; an astrological allusion. Dowden remarks : 
"The passage seems to mean, As the star, over and above what 
can be ascertained concerning it for our guidance at sea, has un- 
knowable occult virtue and influence, so love, beside its power of 
guiding us, has incalculable potencies. This interpretation is con- 
firmed by the next sonnet (117) in which the simile of sailing at 
sea is introduced ; Shakspere there confesses his wanderings, and 
adds as his apology — 

' I did strive to prove 
The constancy and virtue of your love ' — 

constancy, the guiding fixedness of love ; virtue, the ' unknown 
worth.' Walker proposed 'whose north 's unknown,' explaining 
'As, by following the guidance of the northern star, a ship may 
sail an immense way, yet never reach the true north ; so the limit 
of love is unknown. Or can any other good sense be made of 
" north " ? Judicent rei astrononiicce periti? Dr. Ingleby ( The 
Soule Arayed, 1872, pp. 5, 6, note), after quoting in connection 
with this passage the lines in which Caesar speaks of himself (_/. C. 
iii. 1) as 'constant as the northern star,' writes: 'Here human 
virtue is figured under the " true-fix'd and resting quality " of the 
northern star. Surely, then, the worth spoken of must be con- 
stancy or fixedness. The sailor must know that the star has this 
worth, or his latitude would not depend on its altitude. Just so 
without the knowledge of this worth in love, a man " hoists sail to 
all the winds," and is " frequent with unknown minds." ' Height, 
it should be observed, was used by Elizabethan writers in the sense 
of value, and the word may be used here in a double sense, altitude 
(of the star) and value (of love) ; love whose worth is unknown, 
however it may be valued." Herford explains worth as = " occult 
virtue and influence, discoverable only by observation and calcula- 
tion." 

9. Time's fool. The sport or mockery of Time. Cf. 1 Hen. IV. 
v. 4. 81 : " But thought 's the slave of life, and life time's fool." 

II. His brief hours. Referring to Time. 



Notes 221 

12. The edge of doom. The day of doom; as in 55. 12. Cf. 
A. W. iii. 3. 5 : — 

" We '11 strive to bear it for your worthy sake 
To the extreme edge of hazard." 

CXVII 

I. All. All matters or relations. 

5. Frequent. Intimate. In the only other instance of the word 
in S. ( W. T. iv. 2. 36) it is = addicted. Unknown minds — per- 
sons of little note, or obscure. 

6. To time. To the world, or society. .Cf. 70. 6 above. Dowden 
suggests that the meaning may be, " given away to temporary occa- 
sion what is your property and therefore an heirloom for eternity." 
Staunton proposes "them" for time, and Tyler is inclined to agree 
with him. 

10. And on just proof, etc. Add conjecture or suspicion, if you 
will. 

II. Level. Aim; a technical use of the word in gunnery. Cf. 
the verb in 121. 9 below. 

CXVIII 

Apparently a continuation of 117. 

1. Like as. See on 60. 1 above. 

2. Eager. Tart, piquant (Fr. aigre) ; as in Ham. i. 5. 69 : 
" eager droppings into milk." 

4. Purge. Take a cathartic. Cf. 1 Hen. IV. v. 4. 168: "I'll 
purge, and leave sack." 

5. Ne'er-cloying. The quarto has " nere cloying," and the ed. 
of 1640 "neare cloying; " corrected by Malone (the conjecture of 
Theobald). 

6. Frame. Adapt, suit. Cf. 3 Hen. VI. iii. 2. 185. 

7. Meetness. Fitness, propriety ; used by S. only here. 

12. Rank. " Sick (of hypertrophy)," as Schmidt defines it. Cf. 
2 Hen. IV. iv. 1. 64: "To diet rank minds sick. of happiness." 



222 Notes 



CXIX 

This is a continuation of 1 1 8. 

1. Siren tears. The wily tears of seductive women. 

2. Limbecks. Alembics. The word occurs again in Macb. i. 7. 
67. On foul as hell, cf. the references to the "dark lady" in 131. 
13 and 147. 14 below. 

3. Applying fears to hopes. " Setting fears against hopes " 
(Palgrave). 

4. Still losing, etc. " Either, losing in the very moment of vic- 
tory, or gaining victories (of other loves than those of his friend) 
which were indeed but losses" (Dowden). 

7. Fitted. The word must be from the noun Jit, and = started 
by the paroxysms ox fits of his fever. Lettsom would read " flitted," 
which surely would be no improvement. 

II. Ruirtd love, etc. "Note the introduction of the metaphor 
of rebuilt love, reappearing in later sonnets" (Dowden). Cf. C. 
of E. iii. 2. 4, A. and C. iii. 2. 29, T. and C. iv. 2. 109, etc. 

13. To my content. To my true happiness. Content is often 
used by S. in a much stronger sense than now. Tyler explains the 
passage thus : " with a feeling of contentment and satisfaction." 

14. ///. The quarto has "ile ; " corrected by Malone. 



cxx 

Further allusions to the poet's "wretched errors" (119. 5); but 
what these were we do not know. They appear to have no con- 
nection with the " dark lady." 

3. " I must needs be overwhelmed by the wrong I have done to 
you, knowing how I myself suffered when you were the offender " 
(Dowden). 

6. A hell of time. Malone quotes Oth. iii. 3. 169 : — 

" But O, what damned minutes tells he o'er 
Who dotes yet doubts, suspects yet strongly loves ; " ' 



Notes 223 



and R. of L. 1286: — 

" And that deep torture may be call'd a hell, 
When more is felt than one hath power to tell." 

9. Our. Staunton conjectures " sour." Night of tvoe is prob- 
ably metaphorical (that dark and woful time), not a reference to 
some particular night, as Tyler thinks " possible." 

Remember'' d. Reminded ; as in Temp. i. 2. 243 : " Let me re- 
member thee what thou hast promis'd," etc. 

12. Salve. Apology. Cf. 34. 7 above. 

CXXI 

The poet declares that, though he " does not claim to be blame- 
less, he was traduced by persons worse than himself, who were 
therefore unfit to criticise and censure his conduct" (Tyler). 
" Dr. Burgersdijk regards this sonnet as a defence of the stage 
against the Puritans " (Dowden), which seems to me absurd. 

2. When not to be, etc. When one is unjustly reproached with 
being so (that is, vile) . 

3,4. And the just pleasure, etc. "And the legitimate pleasure 
lost, which is deemed vile, not by us who experience it, but by 
others who look on and condemn" (Dowden). 

5. Adulterate. Lewd ; as in Rich. III. iv. 4. 79 and L. C. 175. 
It is = adulterous in R. of L. 1645, Ham. i. 5. 42, etc. 

6. Give salutation, etc. " Take account of and criticise what 
my somewhat warm nature may do in gay or unrestrained mo- 
ments" (Tyler). Herford explains give salutation to as "affect, 
stir." Cf. Hen. VIII. ii. 3. 103 : — 

" Would I had no being, 
If this salute my blood a jot! " 

Sportive = amorous, wanton; as in Rich. III. i. I. 14: "Shap'd 
for sportive tricks." Cf. sport in 96. 2 above. 

8. In their zvi 'lis. " According to their pleasure " (Dowden). 

9. Level. Take aim at. See on 117. 11 above. 



224 Notes 

11. Bevel. Slanting; figuratively opposed to straight, ox "up- 
right." The word is used by S. only lure, 

12. Rank. Foul, gross. Cf. 69. 12 above. See also L. C. 307 : 
" To blush at speeches rank." 

CXXII 

This is evidently an apology for having parted with tables (memo- 
randum-book), the gift of his friend, who seems to have heard what 
the poet had done. Cf. Sonn. 77, where a similar present to his 
friend is mentioned. 

1. Tables. Cf. Ham. i. 5. 107 : " My tables — meet it is I set it 
down, " etc. See also Id. i. 5. 98 : " Yea, from the table of my 
memory," etc. ; Id. i. 3. 58 : — 

" And these few precepts in thy memory 
Look thou character; " 

and T. G. of V. ii. 7. 3 : — 

" Who art the table wherein all my thoughts 
Are visibly character'd and engrav'd." 

3. That idle rank. " That poor dignity (of tables written upon 
with pen or pencil) " (Dowden). 

9. That poor retention. "The table-book given to him by his 
friend, incapable of retaining, or rather of containing, so much as 
the tablet of the brain" (Malone). 

10. Tallies. Notched sticks used to "keep tally," as schoolboys 
still say. Cf. 2 Hen. VI. iv. 7. 39 : " our forefathers had no other 
books but the score and the tally," etc. 

CXXIII 

"In this sonnet, which is probably to be connected with the one 
before it, the poet reverts to the doctrine which had appeared pre- 
viously in 69, that there is nothing new, but that all things occur 
in unending succession " (Tyler). " He now declares that the reg- 



Notes 225 



isters and records of Time are false, but Time shall impose no cheat 
upon his memory or heart " (Dowden). 

2. Thy pyramids. "I think this is metaphorical ; all that Time 
piles up from day to day, all his new stupendous erections are really 
but ' dressings of a former sight.' Is there a reference to the new 
love, the 'ruined love built anew' (119. 11) between the two 
friends ? The same metaphor appears in the next sonnet : ' No, it 
[his love] was builded far from accident ;' and again in 125 : 'Laid 
great bases for eternity,' etc. Does Shakspere mean here that this 
new love is really the same with the old love ; he will recognize the 
identity of new and old, and not wonder at either the past or pres- 
ent?" (Dowden). Herford makes thy pyramids = " all that Time 
piles up from day to day ; new structures of event." Dressings = 
trimming up, ornamental repetitions. 

5. Admire. Wonder at ; as in T. N. iii.4. 165 : " Wonder not, 
nor admire not," etc. 

7. And rather make them, etc. Them refers to the things im- 
plied in what — things that we choose to regard as new, though 
really old. 

11. Records. S. accents the noun on either syllable, as may suit 
the measure. Cf. 55. 8 above. 

CXXIV 

Apparently a continuation of 123. 
I. State. Rank, power. 

3. As subject to Time's love, etc. That is, as being "Time's 
fool" (116. 9). 

4. Weeds, etc. Regarded as weeds or flowers, according to 
Time's caprice. 

5. Builded. The participle is oftener built; as in 1 19. 1 1 and 
123. 2 above. 

7, 8. " When time puts us, who have been in favour, out of 
fashion" (Dowden). 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — 15 



226 Notes 

9. Policy, that heretic. Seeking its own interest, and false to 
love, which is unselfish. Dowden compares R. and J. i. 2. 95 
(Romeo speaking of eyes unfaithful to the beloved) : "Transpar- 
ent heretics, be burnt for liars." 

11. Hugely politic. "Love itself is infinitely prudent, prudent 
for eternity" (Dowden). Hudson takes the phrase to be = "or- 
ganized or knit together in a huge polity or State ; " to which I 
can only add his own comment : " Rather an odd use of politic, to 
us." 

12. That. So that ; as in 76. 7 and 98. 4 above. Steevens con- 
jectures " glows " for grows, and Capell " dries." 

13. 14. To this I witness, etc. Dowden asks : "Does this mean, 
'I call to witness the transitory unworthy loves {fools of time = 
sports of time — cf. 1 16. 9), whose death was a virtue since their life 
was a crime ? ' " Steevens thinks that fools of time, etc., may be " a 
stroke at some of Fox's Martyrs ; " and Palgrave says : "appar- 
ently, the plotters and political martyrs of the time." Hudson sug- 
gests that it may mean, "those fools who make as if they would die 
for virtue after having devoted their lives to vice." Tyler sees an 
allusion to " the popular repute of Essex as the ' good Earl,' not- 
withstanding the ' crimes ' for which he and certain of his compan- 
ions were executed." The reference is hopelessly obscure, and I 
shall add no attempt to explain it. 

cxxv 

This may be closely connected with 124, as Dowden and Tyler 
regard it. The former says : " In 124 S. asserted that his love was 
not subject to time, as friendships founded on self-interest are ; 
here he asserts that it is not founded on beauty of person, and 
therefore cannot pass away with the decay of such beauty. It is 
pure love for love." 

1. Bore the canopy. That is, paid outward homage, as one who 
bears a canopy over a superior. King James I. made his progress 



Notes 227 

through London, 1603-4, under a canopy. In the account of the 
King and Queen's entertainment at Oxford, 1605, we read (Nichol's 
Progresses of King James, \o\. i. p. 546, quoted by Dowden) : " From 
thence was carried over the King and Queen a fair canopy of crim- 
son taffety by six of the Canons of the Church." 

I may add that on the 15th of March, 1604, when James made a 
formal march from the Tower to Westminster, the nine actors (in- 
cluding Shakespeare) to whom he had granted a special license to 
perform in London and the provinces, were in the royal train. Each 
actor was presented with four and a half yards of scarlet cloth, the 
usual dress-allowance to players belonging to the household. 
Whether the actors bore the canopy on this occasion I find no 
record ; but I doubt whether there is a reference to it here. 

2. Extern. Outward show. Cf. Oth. i. 1. 63 : "compliment 
extern." Elsewhere S. uses external ; as in 53. 13 above. On the 
passage, cf. 69. 1-5 above. 

3. Or laid, etc. " The love of the earlier sonnets, which cele- 
brated the beauty of Shakspere's friend, was to last forever, and yet 
it has been ruined " (Dowden). Tyler thinks it refers to the Dedi- 
cation of R. and L. and perhaps also to that of V. and A. 

5. Dwellers on form, etc. " Persons admitted only to external 
relations" (Tyler). For favour (outward appearance), see on 113. 
10 above. 

6. Lose all, and more. " Lose not only affection, but incur still 
further mischiefs" (Tyler). 

8. Pitiful thrivers. To be pitied even when successful. 

9. Obsequious. Devoted, zealous. Cf. M. IV. iv. 2. 2 : "I see 
you are obsequious in your love," etc. Hudson explains it as 
= "mourned or lamented." 

11. Mix' 'd with seconds. Steevens remarks : " I am just informed 
by an old lady, that seconds is a provincial term for the second kind 
of flour, which is collected after the smaller bran is sifted. That 
our author's oblation was pure, unmixed with baser matter, is all 
that he meant to say." Seconds is still used (at least in this country) 



228 Notes 

in the sense which Steevens mentions. I have no doubt that he is 
right in his explanation of the figure, which is not unlike the familiar 
one of the wheat and the chaff (cf. Hen. VIII. v. I. in, Cymb. i. 
6. 178, etc.) ; but Knight thinks otherwise. He says, after quoting 
Steevens's note, " Mr. Dyce called this note ' preposterously absurd. 5 
Steevens, however, knew what he was doing. He mentions the 
flour, as in almost every other note upon the Sonnets, to throw dis- 
credit upon compositions with which he could not sympathize. He 
had a sharp, cunning, pettifogging mind ; and he knew many pro- 
saic things well enough. He knew that a second in a duel, a sec- 
onder in a debate, a secondary in ecclesiastical affairs, meant one 
next to the principal. The poet's friend has his chief oblation ; no 
seconds, or inferior persons, are mixed up with his tribute of affection. 
" In the copy of the Sonnets in the Bodleian Library, formerly 
belonging to Malone (and which is bound in the same volume with 
the Lucrece, etc.), is a very cleverly drawn caricature representing 
Shakspere addressing a periwig-pated old fellow in these lines : — 
' If thou couldst, Doctor, cast 
The water of my Sonnets, find their disease, 
Or purge my Editor till he understood them, 
I would applaud thee.' [Cf. Macb. v. 3. 50 fol.] 
Under this Malone has written, ' Mr. Steevens borrowed this volume 
from me in 1779, to peruse the Rape of Lucrece, in the original edi- 
tion, of which he was not possessed. When he returned it he made 
this drawing. I was then confined by a sore throat, and attended 
by Mr. Atkinson, the apothecary, of whom the above figure, whom 
Shakspeare addresses, is a caricature.' " 

For the figure in seconds I may add the familiar household one of 
bolted (sifted, like flour), which S. uses of persons {Hen. V. ii. 2. 
137) and of language {Cor. iii. 1. 322). See also W. T. iv. 4. 
375 and T. and C. i. 1. 18. He has many other metaphors equally 
"vulgar," as Blair and certain other rhetoricians, trained in the 
school of Pope, call them. For an example in the Sonnets, take 
that of the woman chasing a stray hen, in 143. 



Notes 



229 



12. Mutual render. "Give-and-take. This sonnet appears 
directed against some one who had charged him with superficial 
love " (Palgrave). 

13. Suborned informer ! Dowden asks : " Does this refer to an 
actual person, one of the spies of 121. 7, 8 ? or is the informer 
Jealousy, or Suspicion, as in V. and A. 655 ?" As Tyler suggests, 
it may refer to " the person or persons who had brought charges 
against the poet." 

CXXVI 

"This is the concluding poem of the series addressed to Shaks- 
pere's friend ; it consists of six rhymed couplets. In the quarto 
parentheses follow the twelfth line thus : — 

( ) 

( ) 

as if to show that two lines are wanting. But there is no good rea- 
son for supposing that the poem is defective. In William Smith's 
Chloris, 1596, a ' sonnet ' (No. 27) of this six-couplet form appears " 
(Dowden). See also on p. 13 above. Herford remarks : "This 
poem of twelve lines concludes the first sequence. It may origi- 
nally have concluded the series which ends at 99, forming a ' cen- 
tury ; ' " but this seems to me improbable, as it is doubtful whether 
99 belongs in the series. 

2. Fickle hour. The quarto reads " sickle, hower," and Lin- 
tott " fickle hower." The old text has not been satisfactorily ex- 
plained. White (if his note is meant to be taken seriously) regards 
the line as " a most remarkable instance of inversion for ' Dost hold 
Time's fickle hour-glass, his sickle.' " Walker conjectures " sickle- 
hour," the hour being, as he thinks, " represented poetically as a 
sickle; " which Hudson adopts, adding that the figure is used " for 
the same reason that Time is elsewhere pictured as being armed 
with a scythe." I assume that " sickle " was a misprint for fickle 
(an easy slip of the type when the long s was in vogue), and that 
the meaning is " during its fickle hour." The boy simply held Time's 



l^o Notes 



fickle glass while it ran its fickle hourly course. The repetition of 
fickle is in Shakespeare's manner. Dost hold = dost hold in hand, 
in check, in thy power ; and fickle hour = Time's course that is 
subject to mutation and vicissitude. This seems to me the best that 
can be done for this puzzling passage. For his = its, cf. 9. 10, 14. 
6, 74. 7, and 84. 6 above. 

5. Wrack. For the rhyme, cf. V. and A. 558, R. of L. 841, 
965, and Macb. v. 5. 51. See also on 65. 6 above. 

9. Minion. Darling, favourite. Cf. Temp. iv. I. 98, Macb. i. 2. 
19, etc. 

12. Quietus. "This is the technical term for the acquittance 
which every sheriff receives on settling his accounts at the Ex- 
chequer. Compare Webster, Duchess of Malfii, i. I : ' And 'cause 
you shall not come to me in debt, Being now my steward, here upon 
your lips I sign your Quietus est'" (Steevens). S. uses the word 
again in Ham. iii. 1. 75. 

To render thee. "To yield thee up, surrender thee. When 
Nature is called to a reckoning (by Time ?) she obtains her acquit- 
tance upon surrendering thee, her chief treasure" (Dowden). 

CXXVII 

" The sonnets addressed to his lady begin here. Steevens called 
attention to the fact that ' almost all that is said here on the subject 
of complexion is repeated in L. L. L. iv. 3. 250-258 : "O, who 
can give an oath ? " etc' 

" Herr Krauss points out several resemblances between Sonn. 
126-152 and the Fifth Song of Sidney's Astrophel and Stella (that 
beginning ' While favour fed my hope, delight with hope was 
brought'), in which may be felt 'the ground tone of the whole 
series' of later sonnets" (Dowden). 

Swinburne {Fortnightly Rev. Dec. r, 1880) refers to Sonnets 
127-154 as "incomparably the most important and altogether 
precious division of the Sonnets." 



Notes 



231 



I. In the old age black was not counted fair. White remarks : 
"This is an allusion to the remarkable fact that during the chiv- 
alric ages brunettes were not acknowledged as beauties anywhere 
in Christendom. In all the old contes fabliaux, and romances that 
I am acquainted with, the heroines are blondes. And more, the 
possession of dark eyes and hair, and the complexion that accom- 
panies them, is referred to by the troubadours as a misfortune." 

3. Successive. By order of succession ; as in 2 Hen. VI. iii. 1. 
49 : "As next the king he was successive heir." 

7. Bower. Habitation. Malone reads " hour." 

9. My mistress' brows. The quarto has " eyes " for brows (eye- 
brows), which is due to the Cambridge editors. Walker conjec- 
tures "hairs." Cf. W. T. ii. 1. 8: — 

" Your brows are blacker ; yet black brows, they say, 
Become some women best," etc. 

10. Suited. Clad ; as in M. of V. i. 2. 79, A. W. i. I. 170, etc. 
For and they Dyce reads " as they." 

12. Slandering creation, etc. " Dishonouring nature with a 
spurious reputation, a fame gained by dishonest means" (Dowden). 

13. Becoming of. Gracing. This use of of with verbals is not 
uncommon in S. 

CXXVIII 

1. My music. Cf. 8. 1 above. 

5. Envy. Accented on the second syllable; as in T. of S. ii. 1. 
18 : " Is it for him you do envy me so ? " Malone compares Mar- 
lowe, Edw. II : " If for the dignities thou be envy'd ; " and Sir 
John Davies, Epigrams : " Why doth not Ponticus their fame 
envy?" If it were not for these and other similar instances, we 
might give envy what is called the " hovering accent." 

Jacks. Here used loosely (as probably in common speech) for 
the keys of the virginal upon which the lady is playing. It properly 
means the upright hinder part of the key which strikes the string, 



232 Notes 

rising as the key is pressed down. The virginal was an instrument 
which has been termed " the ancestor of the piano," and was so 
called because used by young girls. It was sometimes called a 
pair of virginals ; as in Dekker's GuVs Hornbooke : "leap up 
and down like the nimble jacks of a pair of virginals." See also 




Virginal (from an old Engraving) 

Harper's Mag. vol. lviii. p. 857, or Elson's Shakespeare and Music. 
The noun is not used by S., but virginalling occurs in W. T. 
i. 2. 125. Steevens quotes Ram Alley, 161 1 : — 

" Where be these rascals that skip up and down 
Like virginal jacks ? " 
11. Thy. The quarto has "their," as in 14; corrected by 
Gildon. 

CXXIX 

Archbishop Trench {Household Book of English Poetry, 1868) 
says of this sonnet: "The subject — the bitter delusion of all 
sinful pleasures, the reaction of a swift remorse which inevitably 



Notes 233 

dogs them — Shakspere must have most deeply felt, as he has 
expressed himself upon it most profoundly. I know no picture of 
this at all so terrible in its truth as, in The Rape of Lucrece 
[687 fol.], the description of Tarquin after he has successfully 
wrought his deed of shame. But this sonnet on the same theme 
is worthy to stand by its side." Cf. also V. and A. 799 fol. 

1. Expense. Expenditure. Cf. 94. 6 above. 

2. Lust. The subject of the sentence. 

9. Mad. The quarto has " Made ; " corrected by Gildon. 

10. Had, having, etc. For the grammar, cf. T. and C. ii. 2. 
263 and Ham. i. 2. 158. 

11. Prov'd, a very woe. The quarto reads "proud and very 
wo ; " corrected by Sewell and Malone. 

12. A dream. Cf. R. of L. 212. 

CXXX 

A playful criticism of the extravagance of poets in praising their 
mistresses. Cf. Sonn. 21. 

4. If hairs be wires. Cf. K. John, iii. 4. 64 : — 

"'O, what love I note 
In the fair multitude of those her hairs ! 
Where but by chance a silver drop hath fallen, 
Even to that drop ten thousand wiry friends 
Do glue themselves," etc. 

The strange comparison is found in Spenser, Marlowe, Peele, and 
other writers of the time. 

5. Damask 'd. Variegated. Cf. A. Y. L. iii. 5. 123 : "Betwixt 
the constant red and mingled damask." 

8. Reeks. Properly = emits vapour, steams ; but here probably 
used for the sake of the rhyme. Cf. V. and A. 555 : " Her face 
doth reek and smoke" (from heat and excitement) ; L. L. L. iv_ 
3. 140: "Saw sighs reek from you ; " J. C. iii. I. 158: "Your 
purpled hands do reek and smoke," etc. 



234 Notes 

14. Any she. Cf. Hen. V. ii. 1. 83 : "the only she," etc. For 
compare, see on 21. 5 above. 

CXXXI 

6. Groan. Cf. 133. 1 below. See also V. and A. 785 : "No, 
lady, no ; my heart longs not to groan," etc. 

11. On another's neck. In close succession. Cf. I Hen. IV. iv. 
3. 92 : — 

" Soon after that, depriv'd him of his life, 
And, in the neck of that, task'd the whole state." 

13. Save in thy deeds. Cf. 144. 4 and 147. 14. 

14. This slander. That her face has not the power to make 
love groan. 

CXXXII ' 

Though the lady's eyes are black, they are fascinating. Cf. 
Sonn. 127. 

2. Knowing thy heart torments. The quarto has " torment " 
for torments, and Malone reads " Knowing thy heart, torment," etc. 
The text is that of the ed. of 1640. 

4. Ruth. Pity. Cf. Rich. II. iii. 4. 106, T. and C. v. 3. 48, etc. 

6. Grey cheeks, etc. Cf. 2 Hen. IV. ii. 3. 19 : "The grey vault 
of heaven." 

9. Mourning. The quarto has "morning," and possibly, as 
Dowden suggests, a play was intended on morning sun and 
mourning face. 

12. Suit thy pity like. That is, clothe it similarly, let it appear 
the same. 

14. And all they foul, etc. Cf. I. I. I. iv. 3. 252 : " No face is 
fair that is not full so black." 

CXXXIII 

" Here Shakspere's heart 'groans ' (see 131) for the suffering of 
his friend as well as his own " (Dowden). 



Notes 235 



I. Beshrew. A mild imprecation. Cf. M. of V. ii. 6. 52, iii. 2. 
14, yJ/. yV. Z>. v. 1. 295, etc. 

6. My next self. My dearest friend. 

II. Keeps. That is, guards. 

CXXXIV 

A continuation of 133. 

5. Wilt not. That is, wilt not restore him. 

7. Write for me. Subscribe for me ; that is, in the bond as 
surety. 

9. Statute. " Statute has here its legal signification, that of a 
security or obligation for money" (Malone). Cf. Ham. v. I. 113 : 
" his statutes, his recognizances," etc. 

10. Use. Interest ; as in 6. 5 above. 

11. Came. That is, who became. 

12. Unkind abuse. " In exposing him to the danger" (Tyler). 

cxxxv 

I. Will. "In this sonnet, in the next, and in 143 the quarto 
marks by italics and capital W the play on words, Will = William 
[Shakspere], Will = William, the Christian name of Shakspere's 
friend [? Mr. W. H.], and Will = desire, volition. Here ' Will 
in overplus ' means Will Shakspere, as the next line shows, ' more 
than enough am I.' The first ' Will ' means desire (but as we know 
that his lady had a husband, it is possible that he also may have 
been a ' Will,' and that the first ' Will ' here may refer to him 
besides meaning 'desire'); the second 'Will' is Shakspere's 
friend" (Dowden). 

Halliwell-Phillipps remarks that in the time of S. quibbles of this 
kind were common, and he cites as an example the riddle on the 
name William in the Book of Riddles to which Slender refers in 
M. W.\. 1 . 209 : — 



1^6 Notes 



" The li. Riddle. — My lovers will 

I am content for to fulfill ; 

Within this rime his name is framed; 

Tell me then how he is named ? 

Solution. — His name is William ; for in the first line is will, and in the 
beginning of the second line is / am, and then put them both together, 
and it maketh William." 

This was a very popular book of the time, mentioned as early 
as 1586. The edition quoted was published in 1629. 

Tyler quotes an interesting parallel to these " Will " sonnets in 
the Dedication by John Davies to his Select Second Husband for 
Sir Thomas Overbury 's Wife, now a Matchless Widow, 1606. It 
is specially appropriate as being addressed to " William, Earle of 
Pembroke " : — 

" Wit and my Will (deere Lord) were late at strife, 
To whom this Bridegroome I for grace might send 
Who Bride was erst the happiest husband's wife 
That ere was haplesse in his Friend, and End. 
Wit, with it selfe, and with my Will, did warre, 
For Will (good- Will) desir'd it might be YOU, 
But Wit found fault with each particular 
It selfe had made ; sith YOU were It to view," etc. 

Cf. also the Epigram addressed to Shakspere by Davies : — 
" Some say, good Will (which I, in sport, do sing), 
Hadst thou not plaid some kingly parts in sport," etc. 

5. Spacious. A trisyllable, like gracious below. 
9. The sea, etc. Cf. T. N. ii. 4. 103 : — 

" But mine is all as hungry as the sea, 
And can digest as much ; " 

and Id. i. 1. 11 : — 

" O spirit of love ! how quick and fresh art thou, 
That, notwithstanding thy capacity 
Receiveth as the sea," etc. 



Notes 237 



13. Let no unkind, no fair beseechers kill. A puzzling line, as it 
stands. Schmidt is doubtful whether unkind is a substantive, and, 
if so, whether it means " unnaturalness," or " aversion to the works 
of love." Palgrave paraphrases thus : " Let no unkindness, no 
fair-spoken rivals destroy me." Dowden says that if unkind is a 
substantive it must mean " unkind one (that is, his lady)," as in 
Daniel's Delia, 2d Sonnet : " And tell th' Unkind how dearly I 
have lov'd her." He adds that possibly no fair may mean " no 
fair one ; " but suggests that perhaps we should print the line 
thus : " Let no unkind ' No ' fair beseechers kill ; " that is, " let no 
unkind refusal kill fair beseechers." This strikes me as a very 
happy solution of the enigma, and I have been strongly tempted to 
adopt it in my text. Tyler approves it, but would read " your " for 
"fair." Herford intended to adopt it, as his note shows, but 
accidentally neglected to insert it in his text, which is the same as 
mine. 

CXXXVI 

5. Fulfil. Fill full. Cf. T. and C. prol. 18 : "fulfilling bolts." 

6. Ay,fill. The quarto has "I fill;" but ay was usually printed "I." 
Dowden suggests that possibly there may be a play on ay and /. 

7. Receipt. Capacity, receptive power ; the only instance of this 
sense in S. 

8. One is reckoned none. See on 8. 14 above. 

10. Store's. The quarto has " stores ; " the Cambridge editors 
follow Malone in reading "stores'." Schmidt says of Store: "used 
only in the sing. ; therefore in Sonn. 136. 10, store's not stores'." 
" Lines 9, 10 mean ' You need not count me when merely counting 
the number of those who hold you dear, but when estimating the 
worth of your possessions, you must have regard to me.' 'To set 
store by a thing or person ' is a phrase connected with the meaning 
of 'store' in this passage " (Dowden). 

12. Something sweet. Walker proposed and Dyce reads " some- 
thing, sweet." 



238 Notes 

13, 14. "Love only my name (something less than loving my- 
self), and then thou lovest me, for my name is Will, and I myself 
am all will, that is, all desire" (Dowden). Tyler paraphrases it 
thus : "You love your other admirer named Will. Love the name 
alone, and then you love me, for my name is Will. " 



CXXXVII 

4. Yet what the best is, etc. "They take a face which, from 
deficiency of beauty, is worst to be best, most beautiful" (Tyler). 
6. Anchored. Cf. A. and C. i. 5. 33 : — 

" and great Pompey 
Would stand and make his eyes grow in my brow ; 
There would he anchor his aspect ; " 

and M. for M. ii. 4. 4 : — 

" Whilst my invention, hearing not my tongue, 
Anchors on Isabel." 

See also Cymb. v. 5. 393, Rich. III. iv. 4. 231, etc. 

Where all men ride indicates her character. Cf. Much Ado,\\\. 
I. no : "every man's Hero." 

9. Several plot. Halliwell-Phillipps says : " Fields that were 
enclosed were called severals in opposition to commons, the former 
belonging to individuals, the others to the inhabitants generally. 
When commons were enclosed, portions allotted to owners of 
freeholds, copyholds, and cottages, were fenced in, and termed 
severals." Cf. L. L. L. ii. 1. 233: "My lips are no common, 
though several they be." 

13. Things right trtte. Referring to "the true character" of 
the lady, " about which there could be no mistake " (Tyler) ; but 
in things right true may mean " in regard to what is true and fair 
in woman." 

14. This false plague. This false and baneful woman. 



Notes 239 



CXXXVIII 

This sonnet appeared as the first poem of The Passionate Pilgrim 
(see pp. II, 16 above) in the following form (except in spell- 
ing) : — 

" When my love swears that she is made of truth, 
I do believe her, though I know she lies, 
That she might think me some untutor'd youth, 
Unskilful in the world's false forgeries. 
Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young, 
Although / know my years be past the best, 
/ smiling credit her false-speaking tongue, 
Outfacing faults in love with love's ill rest. 
But wherefore says my love that she is young? 
And wherefore say not I that I am old? 
O, love's best habit is a soothing tongue, 
And age, in love, loves not to have years told, 
Therefore / '11 lie with love, and love with me, 
Since that our faults in love thus smother' d be." 

The variations are too great to be the work of Jaggard or his 
editor. He must have had a different manuscript. 

2. I do believe her. Pretend to believe her ; that she may think 
me an inexperienced youth. He suppresses the truth, as she does. 

11. Habit. Bearing, deportment. 

CXXXIX 

The poet complains that she shares her favours with others. 

3. Wound me not with thine eye. Malone quotes R. and J. ii. 
4. 14: "stabbed with a white wench's black eye;" and Steevens 
adds 3 Hen. VI. v. 6. 26 : " Ah, kill me with thy weapon, not with 
words ! " See also A. Y. L. iii. 5. 10 fol. 

CXL 

The complaint is continued here. 
2. Tongue-tied. Silent hitherto. 



240 Notes 

4. Pity-zvanting. Unpitied by you. 

6. To tell me so. " lo tell me thou dost love me " (Malone). 
11. Ill-wresting. Misinterpreting, ill-construing. 
14. Bear thine eyes straight, etc. " That is, as it is expressed in 
93. 4, ' Thy looks with me, thy heart in other place ' " (Malone). 

CXLI 

8. Sensual feast. Gratification of the senses. 

9. Five wits. The wits, or intellectual powers, seem to have 
been reckoned as five to correspond with the five senses, which 
were also called wits. Cf. Chaucer, Persones Tale: "the five 
wittis ; as sight, hereing, smelling, savouring, and touching." 
Boswell quotes a prayer by Sir Thomas More, in which he asks 
to be forgiven for his sins "in mispending of my five wittes." 
Schmidt says that " the proverbial five wits " were " common wit, 
imagination, fantasy, estimation, memory." In the present pas T 
sage we find the two meanings distinguished. 

1 1 . Who leaves unswafd, etc. " My heart ceases to govern me, 
and so leaves me no better than the likeness of a man — a man 
without a heart — in order that it may become slave to thy proud 
heart" (Dowden). 

14. Pain. "In its old etymological sense of punishment" 
(Walker) ; but though the word implies that the suffering was 
right and fitting, " we need not give it the special sense of penalty " 
(Tyler). 

CXLII 

1. Thy dear virtue. Thy cherished virtue — the only virtue she 
has. She hates him for his love, and his love is sin; and so far she 
is right. But, he adds, you are just as sinful. 

6. Their scarlet ornaments. Cf. Edw. III. ii. 1 : " His cheeks 
pat on their scarlet ornaments." The line occurs in the part of 
the play ascribed by some to S. See on 94. 14 above. 



Notes 241 



7. SeaPd false bonds of love. Cf. V. and A. 511 : — 

" Pure lips, sweet seals in my soft lips imprinted, 
What bargains may I make, still to be sealing ? " 

See also M. for M. iv. 1.5 and M. of V. ii. 6. 6. 

8. RobVd others' beds' revenues, etc. " Implying, probably, that 
she had received the attentions of other married men" (Tyler). 

9. Be it lawful, etc. Cf. Sonn. 139. 

13. If thou dost seek, etc. "If you seek for pity, but will show 
none." 

CXLIII 

An elaborate but homely simile. See on 125. 11. 

4. Pursuit. Accented on the first syllable ; the only instance 
in S. Cf. pursue in M. of V. iv. 1. 298: "We trifle time ; I pray 
thee, pursue sentence." Walker gives many examples of pursuit ; 
as Heywood, Dutchess of Suffolk : "The eager pursuit of our ene- 
mies ; " Spanish Tragedy : " Thy negligence in pursuit of their 
deaths ; " Beaumont and Fletcher, Wit at Several Weapons, v. 1 : 
" In pursuit of the match, and will enforce her ; " Massinger, Fatal 
Dowry, ii. 2 : '* Forsake the pursuit of this lady's honour," etc. 

8. Not prizing. Not regarding. 

13. Will. " Possibly, as Steevens takes it, Will Shakspere ; but 
it seems as likely, or perhaps more likely, to be Shakspere's friend 
1 Will' [? W. H.]. The last two lines promise that Shakspere will 
pray for her success in the chase of the fugitive (Will?), on condi- 
tion that, if successful, she will turn back to him, Shakspere, her 
babe" (Dowden). This, in my opinion is clearly the meaning. 

CXLIV 

"This sonnet appears as the second poem in The Passionate 
Pilgrim with the following variations: in 2, 'That like;' in 3, 
' My better angel ; ' in 4, ' My worser spirit ; ' in 6, ' from my side ; ' 
in 8, ' fair pride; ' in II, ' For being both to me; ' in 13, 'The 

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — l6 



242 Notes 

truth I shall not know.' Compare with this sonnet the 20th of 
Drayton's Idea : — 

' An evil spirit, your beauty haunts me still, 

Which ceaseth not to tempt me to each ill ; 

Thus am I still provok'd to every evil 

By that good-wicked spirit, sweet angel-devil.' 

Compare also Astrophel and Stella, 5th Song : — 

' Yet witches may repent, thou art far worse than they, 
Alas, that I am forst such evill of thee to say, 
I say thou art a Divill though cloth'd in Angel's shining : 
For thy face tempts my soule to leave the heaven for thee,' etc." 

(Dowden). 

For the general misunderstanding of this sonnet, see p. 38 above. 
2. Suggest. Tempt. Cf. Oth. ii. 3. 358 : — 

" When devils will the blackest sins put on, 
They do suggest at first with heavenly shows," etc. 

6. From my side. The quarto has " sight ; " corrected from the 
P. P. version. 

11. From me. Away from me ; a common meaning of/row. 

14. Till my bad angel, etc. Dowden compares 2 Hen. IV. ii. 4. 
365:- 

" Prince Henry. For the women ? 
Falstaff. For one of them, she is in hell already, and burns poor souls." 

1 prefer Hanmer's reading "burns, poor soul," but the allusion in 
burns is the same in either case. 



CXLV 

" The only sonnet written in eight-syllable verse. Some critics, 
partly on this ground, partly because the rhymes are ill-managed, 
reject it as not by Shakspere" (Dowden). 



Notes 243 



13. ' I hate'' from hate, etc. " She removed the words I hate to a 
distance from hatred ; she changed their natural import ... by 
subjoining not you'''' (Malone). He compares K. of L. 1534-1537. 
Steevens would read " I hate — away from hate she flew," etc. ; 
that is, " having pronounced the words / hate, she left me with a 
declaration in my favour." Dowden is inclined to accept Malone's 
explanation, but thinks the meaning may possibly be, " from hatred 
to such words as I hate, she threw them away." 

CXLVI 

Eminently a religious sonnet, though it seems to have been mis- 
understood by Tyler. See on line 1 1 below. 

2. Pressed by these rebel powers, etc. The quarto has " My sin- 
full earth these rebbell," etc. The corruption was doubtless due 3 
as Malone suggests, to the compositor's inadvertently repeating the 
closing words of the first verse at the beginning of the second, 
omitting two syllables that belong there. Many emendations have 
been proposed: " Fool'd by those" (Malone), " Starv'd by the" 
(Steevens), "Fool'd by these " (Dyce), " Foil'd by these" (Pal- 
grave), " Hemm'd with these" (Furnivall), "Thrall to these" 
(anonymous), "Slave of these" (Cartwright), "Leagued with 
these" (Brae), "Why feed'st " (Tyler's — the worst), etc. Pressed 
by is due to Dowden, and it is on the whole as good a guess as any 
that has been made. 

Array is explained by some as = clothe. Massey thinks it also 
signifies "that in the flesh these rebel powers set their battle in 
array against the soul." Dr. Ingleby, in his pamphlet The Soule 
Arayed, 1872 (reprinted in Shakespeare : the Man and the Book, 
Part I., 1877), takes the ground that array (or aray) is = abuse, 
afflict, ill-treat. He gives several examples of this sense from 
writers of the time. It is not found elsewhere in S., but we have 
rayed in T. of S. iii. 2. 54 and iv. 1. 3, where Schmidt explains it 
as "defiled, dirtied," I prefer this explanation to that which 



244 Notes 

makes array — clothe — which seems to me forced and unnatural 
here — but I should prefer Massey's "set their battle in array 
against" to either if any other example of this meaning could be 
found. Perhaps the turn thus given to the military sense is no 
more remarkable than the liberties S. takes with sundry other 
words ; and here the exigencies of the rhyme might justify it. 
For the rebel powers and the outzvard walls, cf. R. of L. 722: — 

" She says her subjects with foul insurrection 
Have batter 'd down her consecrated wall, 
And by their mortal fault brought in subjection 
Her immortality, and made her thrall 
To living death and pain perpetual." 

8. Thy charge ? That on which you have expended so much. Cf. 
K. John, i. 1. 49 : "this expedition's charge," etc. 

10. Aggravate. Increase. Cf. M. N. D. i. 2. 84 (Bottom's 
speech) : "I will aggravate my voice," etc. 

11. Terms. Walker says : "In the legal and academic sense ; 
long periods of time, opposed to hours" Cf. 2 Hen. IV. v. I. 90 : 
" the wearing out of six fashions, which is four terms, or two 
actions." Tyler strangely takes this passage to refer only to " im- 
mortal renown, which is to be purchased by . . . study and enthu- 
siastic literary work." He also refers 13, 14, to mere "literary 
immortality." 

CXLVII 

Dowden regards this as "in connection with 146," which seems 
to me to be entirely independent of this series. 

5*5 My reason, the physician, etc. Malone compares M. W. ii. 
1. 5 : "though Love use Reason for his physician," etc. 

7. Approve. Find by experience (that). Cf. Oth. ii. 3. 317 : 
" I have well approved it," etc. 

8. Except. Object to, refuse. Palgrave explains thus : " I now 
discover that desire which reason rejected is death ; " but Dowden, 
better, " desire which did object to physic." Physic did except 



Notes 245 



repeats the idea in prescriptions not kept, not that in reason . . . 
hath left me, as Palgiave seems to suppose. 

9. Past cure, etc. Cf. L. L. L. v. 2. 28 : "past cure is still past 
care." It was a proverbial saying. Malone quotes Holland's 
Leaguer, a pamphlet published in 1632 : " She has got the adage 
in her mouth ; Things past cure, past care." 

10. Evermore unrest. Walker compares Coleridge, Remorse, 
v. I : — 

" hopelessly deform'd 
By sights of evermore deformity." 

Sidney {Arcadia, book v.) has " the time of my ever farewell ap- 
proacheth." 

14. As black as hell. Cf. 131. 12-14 an d 144. 4. 

CXLVIII 

4. Censures. Judges. Cf. K. John, ii. 1. 328,/. C. iii. 2. 16, 
etc.; and for the noun ( = judgment), Macb. v. 4. 14, Ham. i. 3. 
69, etc. 

8. Love's eye, etc. The quarto (followed by most of the editors) 
ends the line with " all mens : no." The reading in the text was 
suggested by Lettsom, and is adopted by Dyce, the Cambridge 
editors ("Globe" ed.), and others. It assumes a play upon eye 
and ay. Lettsom afterwards proposed "that" for love in the pre- 
ceding line. 

13. O cunning Love! "Here he is perhaps speaking of his 
mistress, but if so, he identifies her with ' Love,' views her as Love 
personified, and so the capital L is right " (Dowden). Tyler thinks 
Love has the same sense as in I above. 

CXLIX 

" Connected with 148, as appears from the closing lines of the 
two sonnets " (Dowden). 

2. Partake? Take part ; the only instance of the verb in this 



246 Notes 

sense in S., but cf. the noun in 1 Hen. VI. ii. 4. 100 : "your par- 
taker Pole." 

4. All tyrant. Possibly vocative, as Dowden makes it = thou 
who art a complete tyrant. Malone conjectures "all truant." 
Tyler explains it as = " Thus play the tyrant towards myself ; " that 
is, in being "reckless of his own interests." 

7. Lower' st. Frownest ; as in C. of E. ii. 1. 86, etc. 

8. Present. Instant, immediate ; as very often. 

CL 

2. With insufficiency, etc. "To rule my heart by defects" 
(Dowden). 

4. And swear, etc. " Implying, if the day is bright and beauti- 
ful, thou certainly art not so" (Tyler). 

5. This becoming of things ill. Malone quotes A. and C. ii. 2. 

243 = — 

" for vilest things 

Become themselves in her," etc. 

7. Warrantise of skill. Surety or pledge of ability. Cf. 
1 Hen. VI. i. 3. 13 : "I'll be your warrantise." 

CLI 

Omitted by Palgrave. See on 20 above. Dowden remarks : 
"Mr. Massey, with unhappy ingenuity, misinterprets thus : 'The 
meaning of Sonnet 151, when really mastered, is that he is be- 
trayed into sin with others by her image, and in straying elsewhere 
he is in pursuit of her ; it is on her account.' " 

3. Cheater. Staunton takes the word to be here = escheator, as 
in M. W. i. 3. 77, but the ordinary meaning is clearly the right one. 
For amiss, see on 35. 7 above. 

10. Triumphant prize. "Triumphal prize, the prize of his 
triumph" (Walker). Pride = proud conquest. 

12. To stand, etc. Cf. Mercutio's speech in R. and J. ii. 1. 22-29. 



Notes 247 

14. Rise and fall. Tyler explains : "Rise in the triumph of 
the flesh, and fall in the subjugation and humiliation of the spirit; " 
but the latter part of the paraphrase is too serious for the general 
tone of the sonnet, which is the only one in the series which is 
frankly and realistically gross. There is nothing of the spirit of 
129 in it. 

CLII 

The poet admits his own sin, but declares that hers is worse. 

3. In act thy bed-vow broke. This seems to imply that the 
Lidy was married, but bed-voiv may possibly refer to her illicit re- 
lations with the poet, to whom she had pledged a " faith unfaith- 
ful, falsely true," as Tennyson expresses it. But since we cannot 
identify her, the simpler interpretation may be correct, though it is 
singular that elsewhere in the Sonnets we should find no reference 
to a husband if she had one. 

9. Kindness. Affection, tenderness; as in Much Ado, iii. I. 113 : 

" If thou dost love, my kindness shall incite thee 
To bind our loves up in a holy band." 

11. To enlighten thee, etc. "To see thee in the brightness of 
imagination I gave away my eyes to blindness, made myself blind " 
(Dowden). 

13. Perjured I. The quarto has "eye" for // corrected by 
Sewell. 

CLIII 

Malone remarks : " This and the following sonnet are composed 
of the very same thoughts differently versified. They seem to have 
been early essays of the poet, who perhaps had not determined 
which he should prefer. He hardly could have intended to send 
them both into the world." 

Herr Krauss (quoted by Dowden) believes these sonnets to be 
harmless trifles, written for the gay company at some bathing- 
place. 



248 Notes 

Herr Hertzberg (Jahrbuch der Deutschen Shakespeare- Gesell- 
schaft, 1878, pp. 158-162) has found a Greek source for these 
two sonnets. He writes : " Dann ging ich an die palatinische An- 
thologie und fand daselbst nach langem Suchen im ix. Buche 
('EirideiKTLKd) unter N. 637 die ersehnte Quelle. . . . Es lautet : — 

ToS' vnb Tas TrXaTavovs a.7raAa> TerpiijueVos \mvu> 

evSev *Epa>s, vvp.<f)ai<; Ka/xTrdSa napOevos. 
Nuju.</)ai 6"' aWriXyai, ' ri fx.eWofj.ev ; alQe 5e roiira) 

ai3eo-aafj.ev,' elnov, ' bp-ov nvp /cpaSirjs fxepowcuv. 
Aa/u.7rds 6' ws e4>\e£e nai, vSara, 8epij.bv eicelOev 

Nv'jot^ai 'EpwriaSe? \ovrpoxoevo-iv vBuyp." 

Dowden adds : "The poem is by the Byzantine Marianus, a writer 
probably of the fifth century after Christ. The germ of the poem 
is found in an Epigram by Zenodotus : — 

Tt? yAui/za? rbv 'Epoira napa Kpr)vr)<Tiv e6r\K.ev ; 
Oiofxevoq nava-etv tovto to irvp vSan. 

How Shakspere became acquainted with the poem of Marianus we 
cannot tell, but it had been translated into Latin : ' Selecta Epi- 
gram mata, Basel, 1529,' and again several times before the close 
of the sixteenth century. 

" I add literal translations of the epigrams : ' Here 'neath the 
plane trees, weighed down by soft slumber, slept Love, having 
placed his torch beside the Nymphs. Then said the Nymphs to 
one another, " Why do we delay ? Would that together with 
this we had extinguished the fire of mortals' heart ! " But as the 
torch made^the waters also to blaze, hot is the water the amorous 
Nymphs (or the Nymphs of the region of Eros) draw thence 
for their bath.' 

"' Who was the man that carved [the statue of] Love, and set it 
by the fountains, thinking to quench this fire with water? ' 

"In Surrey's Complaint of the Lover Disdained (Aldine ed. 
p. 1 2), we read of a hot and a cold well of love. Shenstone (Works, 
ed. 1777, vol.i. p. 144) versifies anew the theme of this and the 
following sonnet in his ' Anacreontic' Hermann Isaac suggests 



Notes 249 



that the valley-fountain may signify marriage, but this will hardly 
agree with 154. 12, 13." 

6. Dateless. Eternal. Cf. 30. 6 above. Lively = living ; as in 
V. and A. 498, etc. 

7. Prove. Find by trying, find to be. Cf. 72. 4 above. 

11. Bath. The quarto has "bath," but Steevens suggests that 
we should print " Bath " (the name of the English city). 

14. Eyes. The quarto has " eye ; " corrected in the ed. of 1640. 



CLIV 

7. The general of hot desire. In L. L. L. iii. 1. 187 he is called 

" great general 
Of trotting paritors." 

Cf. Two Noble Kinsmen, v. I. 163 : "our general of ebbs and 
flows" (Diana, or Luna). 

12. Thrall. Bondman. Cf. Macb. iii. 6. 13 : "the slaves of 
drink and thralls of sleep," etc. 

13. This by that, etc. That is, the statement in the next line. 



APPENDIX 

The Sonnets and the Baconian Theory 

The Sonnets have been a stumbling-block to many of the 
" Baconians." As Grant White remarks, " that Bacon wrote them 
is morally impossible," and, I should add, poetically impossible. 
But whoever wrote them must also have written the plays. The 
"parallelisms" of style in the plays and the Sonnets are far more 
remarkable than any which the Baconians imagine they find in the 
works of Bacon and Shakespeare. 

Mr. W. D. O'Connor, in his Hamlet's Note-Book, agrees with 
Grant White that the Sonnets cannot be Bacon's : "The considera- 
tions which he [White] advances are manifestly conclusive." 
" He might have gone further," adds Mr. O'Connor, " and shown 
that their autobiographic revelations are no less incompatible with 
the history of Bacon's life." We are then told that Sir Walter 
Raleigh wrote the Sonnets ; as Mr. George S. Caldwell had main- 
tained nearly ten years earlier in Australia. 

Mr. Caldwell's pamphlet was entitled Is Sir Walter Raleigh the 
Author of Shakespeare's Plays and Sonnets? (Melbourne, 1877). 
It was to be followed by a book (which, so far as I know, was never 
published), the greater portion of which, he said, was to be made 
up of " extracts from The History of the World [by Raleigh] and 
from the plays." He added : "These extracts will show so com- 
plete an identification of opinions, principles, and peculiarities of 
thought and expression, as will, I am sanguine, carry conviction to 
the minds of every interested reader that the plays must have been 
written by Raleigh. . . . After five years' consideration, I now say 

250 



Appendix 251 



that the materials in my possession are sufficient to finally settle the 
controversy." In his pamphlet he says : "The Sonnets 71, 72, 
73, and 74, to my mind, afford proof than which nothing could 
be stronger of the identification of Raleigh as the author. With 
most unwavering confidence I advance the proposition that these 
sonnets were addressed by Raleigh to his wife when he was lying 
under sentence of death in 1603." Some of the Sonnets, he be- 
lieves, were addressed to Elizabeth. Sonnet 37 was a tribute to 
Prince Henry. Raleigh before 1596 had a limp ; in that year he 
was wounded and became lame for the rest of his life (cf. Sonn. 
37 and 89). 

Another Australian, Mr. William Thomson (in The Renascence 
Drama', or History made Visible, Melbourne, 1880), informs us 
that the Sonnets were written by Bacon in 1600, to be read by 
William Herbert to the Queen, and thereby to win back her regard 
for her offending truant Essex, when the " lord of my love " lay 
under his last eclipse. Elizabeth was a " black " beauty, not liter- 
ally, but as being hostile in mind and will to Essex. 

In 1881, Mrs. C. F. Ashmead-Windle of San Francisco printed 
an Address to the Nezv Shakspere Society of London, in which she 
announced the " discovery of Lord Verulam's undoubted authorship 
of the Shakspere works." She fancied that she found in the 
plays " an enigma under a veiled allegory," the key to which " is 
contained in the mystery of the Sonnets." An "absolute divineness 
of ideality underlies their mere outward form, as well as a plaintive 
autobiographical information of the poet's consciousness." She 
illustrates her discovery by comments on Cymbeline, where Pos- 
thumus symbolizes the posthumous fame of Bacon, Cloten (" cloth- 
ing") his living bodily personality, and Morgan ("my organ") 
the Novum Organum. Posthumus is the son of Sicilius, and the 
sonnet-form is of Sicilian origin. Sicilius, therefore, signifies the 
" poetic genius " invoked in the sonnets of Bacon as a " lovely 
boy," and urged to beget " copies " of himself that should gain 
enduring fame. Tenantius, by whom Sicilius " had his titles " of 



1^1 Appendix 

beauty, grace, and honour, was the author of the Sonnets and the 
plays, or Bacon. Mrs. Windle modestly remarks : " I feel that my 
penetration into, and unfolding of the inmost mind and heart of 
these plays, is a realization of the deepest reach of sympathetic 
intuition of which the human intellect and soul are capable — only 
short of that attained by the immortal dramatist." 

The poor lady, if not already insane, afterwards became so, like 
Delia Bacon, and died in an asylum; but in 1882 she had printed 
a second pamphlet in the form of a Report to the British Museum, 
setting forth " the. discovery and opening of the cipher of Francis 
Bacon, Lord Verulam, alike in his prose writings and the ' Shak- 
spere ' dramas, proving him the author of the dramas." The sup- 
posed hidden significance of the titles of the plays, and of the names 
of the characters in them, is here illustrated more fully. The title 
of Othello, for instance, is thus elucidated: — 

" A tale, oh ! I tell, oh ! 
Oh, dell, oh ! What wail, oh ! 
Oh, hill, oh ! What willow ! 
What hell, oh ! What will, oh ! 
At will, oh ! At well, oh ! 
I dwell, oh ! " 

Desdemona is analyzed as " With a demon A, with a moan, ah ! " 
and refers to " the double tragedy of Bacon's muse ; " Emilia stands 
for " I 'm ill, you, I mill you," and refers to " the expression of 
Bacon's ill, continued in play after play, as milestones of his life." 
This crazy juggling with names is carried through all the plays, and 
similarly used to illustrate Bacon's life and literary career. It is 
the lunacy of the Baconian "cipherers" and "cranks" in its ulti- 
mate development. "That way madness lies ! " 

In 1887, Judge H. L. Hosmer brought out a book in San Fran- 
cisco entitled, Bacon and Shakespeare in the Sonnets, in which 
he takes the ground that these poems are addressed by Bacon to 
Shakespeare, and that in them the former makes over the plays to 
the latter, and gives him directions concerning the concealment of 



Appendix 253 

their true authorship. The Sonnets also contain much impersona- 
tion of Youth and Thought (both of these " in the abstract and 
in delineation"), the Drama, Tragedy, etc. 

I will quote but a single amusing illustration of the manner in 
which this "learned judge" interprets the poems and shows how 
they prove Bacon's authorship. In Sonn. 76, we read : — 

" Why write I still all one, ever the same, 
And keep invention in a noted weed, 
That every word doth almost tell my name, 
Showing their birth and where they did proceed ? " 

Superficial critics have supposed that to " keep invention in a 
noted weed" meant to clothe imagination, or the creations of im- 
agination, in a well-known or familiar dress (that of the sonnet) ; 
but this is a sad misconception. Judge Hosmer remarks : "The 
only weed of which history gives any account in Elizabeth's time 
was tobacco. The word tobacco, by its various forms of pronun- 
ciation, was blessed with an orthography that would fill a small 
dictionary." Examples are given, including J bacco and baccy, and 
he continues : " In every form which spelling gave to tobacco, it 
almost told the name of Bacon." He adds triumphantly : " This 
evidence of the true origin of the dramas of Shakespeare, written 
by their author, and published nearly three centuries ago, during 
Shakespeare's life, cannot by any force of logic or ingenuity be de- 
stroyed. . . . No other name can fill the requirements of that line 
but Bacon." I know nothing about "Judge Hosmer" (as the 
local reviewers of his book designate him) except that he is the 
author of this erudite work on the Sonnets. Whether he is still 
living (1905), and in his right mind, I have not been able to 
learn. 1 

Judge Holmes (the ablest and sanest of the Baconian writers) 
has no doubt that the Sonnets, like the plays, were written by 

1 He is not mentioned in Adams's Dictionary of American Authors 
(revised ed. 1905) nor in the American Who's Who (1905 ed.) 



254 Appendix 

Bacon. " The similitudes of thought and diction," he says, " are 
such as to put at rest all question on that head. . . . They bear 
the impress of Bacon's mind, . . . and they exhibit states of mind 
and feeling which will find an explanation nowhere better than in 
his personal history." We know that " Bacon wrote sonnets ; some 
of them were addressed to the queen, and were ' commended by 
the great.' " Meres's reference to Shakespeare's " sugred sonnets 
among his private friends" is not inconsistent with the theory of 
Bacon's authorship, for " we positively know that his sonnets and 
essays did pass from hand to hand in that manner." In 1609, after 
some of these sonnets had got into print (by Jaggard, in 1599), 
he took care "to see them published in authentic form, though in 
this instance under the name of another, for he had determined 
not to be known as a poet." 

The most recent of the Baconians, " His Honour Judge Webb, 
Regius Professor of Laws and Public Orator in the University of 
Dublin," as his name appears on the title-page of The Mystery of 
William Shakespeare (London, 1902), also believes that Bacon 
wrote the Sonnets. He says : " By showing that they were ad- 
dressed to Southampton, Mr. Lee has unconsciously suggested 
reasons for believing that they were addressed to him by Bacon. 
Southampton was the ward of Bacon's uncle ; he was a member of 
Bacon's Inn ; he was one of Bacon's set ; he tilted in the ' Device ' 
which Bacon had prepared for Essex ; and till the miserable fiasco 
of 1 601 he was the bosom friend of Bacon." For the continuation 
of the subject the curious reader may be referred to the Judge's 
book, pp. 163-166 \ and also to pp. 263, 264, where he attempts 
to prove that the edition of the Sonnets in 1609 was not a piratical 
enterprise ; " the extraordinary care with which they are arranged, 
punctuated, and printed, being proof that they were published 
with the author's concurrence and consent, if not under his actual 
supervision." How, with all this extraordinary care, it happened 
that the two blank lines in parentheses were inserted at the end 
of Sonn, 126, the Judge does not inform us. He ends, however. 



Appendix 255 

by repeating that " it was the author only who could have arranged 
them and committed them to the press ; " but, whoever may have 
done this, they contained the sonnet which warned the public that 
Shakespeare was not the real name of the author but the ' noted 
weed' in which he kept invention" (Sonn. 76). 

I believe that Mr. Edwin Reed was the first (in one of the early 
editions of his Bacon vs. Shakespeare) to suggest this ridiculous 
interpretation of Sonn. 76. "Here," he says, "is a plain state- 
ment that the author of this sonnet was writing under a disguise." 
He adds : " Weed signifies garment ; particularly (as Bacon else- 
where uses it) one that disguises the wearer." This is not true of 
the word as generally used by Elizabethan writers ; and, if Bacon 
wrote the Shakespeare plays, he has sometim'es used it as distinctly 
opposed to a disguise. In T. N. (v. 1. 262) Viola, then in boy's 
dress, says : — 

" I '11 bring you to a captain in this town 
Where lie my maiden weeds ; " 

and a few lines below (280) the Duke says : — 

" Give me thy hand ; 
And let me see thee in thy woman's weeds." 

Again, in Cymbeline (v. 1. 23) Posthumus says : — 

" I '11 disrobe me 
Of these Italian weeds, and suit myself 
As does a Breton peasant ; " 

that is, he will take off the dress he has been wearing as a soldier 
in the Roman army, and assume the disguise of a British peasant. 

These illustrations of the Baconian methods of dealing with the 
Sonnets are chosen quite at random from the few books which I 
have kept, as representative of the literature of the lunacy, out of 
the many that have come into my possession from time to time. x 

1 In editing a department of " Shakespeariana " in the Literary 
World and the Critic, and in other ways. 



256 Appendix 

Most of them have been discarded as not worth shelf-room in my 
library. 

For the bibliography of the subject, the reader may be referred 
to Dowden's larger ed. of the Sonnets (London, 1881), pp. 36-110, 
and to Mr. W. H. Wyman's Bibliography of the Bacon- Shake- 
speare Controversy (Cincinnati, 1884). Both authorities give many 
interesting extracts from the books, pamphlets, etc., and comments 
thereupon. 



Was Barnabe Barnes the "Rival Poet?" 

As we have seen (p. 43 above), Mr. Sidney Lee believes thajt 
Barnabe Barnes was the " rival poet " of Sonnets 79-86. This 
seems to me on the whole the least successful of the many attempts 
to identify the man ; but Barnes is so little known to readers and 
students in general that a brief discussion of his claims to the posi- 
tion thus accorded to him is not inappropriate here. 

In his interesting introduction to the valuable collection of 
Elizabethan Sonnets, newly arranged and edited from Arber's 
" English Garner," Mr. Lee refers to Barnes thus : — 

"Barnabe Barnes, who made his reputation as a Sonneteer in 
the same year as Lodge (1593) was more voluminous than any of 
his English contemporaries. The utmost differences of opinion 
have been expressed by modern critics as to the value of his work. 
One denounces him as ' a fool ; ' another eulogizes him as ' a born 
singer.' He clearly had a native love of literature, and gave prom- 
ise of lyric power which was never quite fulfilled. His Sonnet 66 
on ' Content ' reaches a very high level of artistic beauty, and 
many single stanzas and lines ring with true harmony. But as a 
whole his work is crude, and lacks restraint. He frequently sinks 
to meaningless doggerel, and many of his grotesque conceits are 
offensive." 

At this point, Mr. Lee inserts this footnote : " Cf. Sonnet 63, 
where, not content with wishing himself to be his mistress's 



Appendix 257 

gloves, her pearl necklace, and her ' belt of gold,' the poet prays 
to be also metamorphosed into ' That sweet wine which down her 
throat doth trickle.'" Mr. Lee did not dare — and I cannot ven- 
ture — to add the next two lines in which the "offensive" conceit 
is most realistically carried out. The passage is not more gross 
than others in Barnes's poems, but I know of none in worse taste, 
as such things go. 

It will be seen that Mr. Lee damns Barnes with decidedly " faint 
praise." If we judged the Sonneteer by this critical estimate of 
his work, I doubt whether we could believe it possible that Shake- 
speare would have honoured him by recognizing him as a worthy 
rival in verse, or that Southampton (to whom Mr. Lee supposes 
Sonnets 79-86 to have been addressed) could have so regarded 
him. A poet whose early promise was " never quite fulfilled," 
whose work "as a whole" is "crude," and who "frequently sinks 
to meaningless doggerel" could hardly be the " better spirit " who, 
" in polish'd form of well-refined pen," has outdone Shakespeare 
in eulogizing his young friend. Could it be such a poetaster, who 
has put to silence the muse of Shakespeare, and concerning whom 
he asks : — 

" Was it the proud full sail of his great verse, 
Bound for the prize of all too precious you, 
That did my ripe thoughts in my brain inhearse, 
Making their tomb the womb wherein they grew ? 
Was it his spirit, by spirits taught to write 
Above a mortal pitch, that struck me dead? " 

Mr. Lee, to my thinking, adds insult to injury by accusing 
Shakespeare of imitating Barnes. Of the latter he says : " Con- 
stantly he strikes a note which Shakespeare clearly echoed in fuller 
tones." The only examples of this which he gives, 1 though he 

1 Two others are mentioned in his Life of S. (pp. 134, 152) : the 
figure of the ship in Sonn. 80, similar to that in Barnes's Sonn. 91 ; and 
that of the tears " distill'd from limbecks foul as hell," in Sonn. 119, 
SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS — I 7 



258 Appendix 

says that " the parallels between Shakespeare's and Barnes's son- 
nets are far more numerous " than space permits him to cite, are 
as follows : — 

" Cf. Barnes's Sonnet 56 : ' The dial ! love which shows how 
my days spend ; ' or 64 : ' If all the loves were lost, and should 
be found ; ' or 15: — 

' Where or to whom, then, shall I make complaint ? 

. . . when I shall resign 
Thy love's large charter and thy bonds again.' 

Shakespeare followed Barnes in the free use of law terms (cf. 
Barnes's Sonnets 4, 7, 20)." 

But these " parallelisms," so far as cited (and we may suppose 
that Mr. Lee gives what he regards as some of the most striking 
of his " numerous " instances) are much like those on which the 
" Baconians " lay so much stress, — familiar figures and allusions 
found in many writers of the time. Legal terms, as Mr. Lee him- 
self shows, are common in many of the Elizabethan Sonnets, and 
Judge Allen (in his Notes on the Bacon- Shakespeare Question, 
Boston, 1900) has proved that they are as frequent in contempo- 
rary dramatists as in Shakespeare. 

The "dial" reference is merely a verbal "parallel." The two 
slight allusions in Shakespeare are to the dial as illustrating the 
passage of time ; and in the first {Sonn. 77) the sun-dial is clearly 
meant (as "shady stealth " proves), and perhaps also in the second 
(Sojtn. 104). But Barnes's "dial" is a town-clock, symbolizing 
love, and the figure is elaborated, in his usual bad fashion, through 
the entire Sonnet, which may be quoted as an example of his style 
rather above the average : — 

" The Dial ! love, which shews how my days spend, 
The leaden Plummets sliding to the ground ! " 

which is supposed to have been " adopted " from Barnes's Sonn. 49, 
quoted by me below. The former figure is a familiar one in poets of • 
the time, and the latter is by no means rare. 



Appendix 259 

My thoughts, which to dark melancholy bend. 

The rolling Wheels, which turn swift hours round ! 

Thine eyes, Parthenope ! my Fancy's guide. 

The Watch, continually which keeps his stroke ! 

By whose oft turning, every hour doth slide ; 

Figure the sighs, which from my liver smoke, 

Whose oft invasions finish my life's date. 

The Watchman, which, each quarter, strikes the bell ! 

Thy love, which doth each part examinate ; 

And in each quarter, strikes his forces fell. 

That Hammer and great Bell, which end each hour ! 

Death, my life's victor, sent by thy love's power." 

This is copied exactly from Mr. Lee's Elizabethan Sonnets (vol. i. 
p. 203). The reader may disentangle the metaphors if he can. 

Mr. Lee is evidently hard pushed to find a creditable specimen 
of Barnes's work. He refers above to Sonnet 66, which he also 
praises twice in his Life of Shakespeare (pp. 132 and 432), quoting 
it in full the second time. It is no more than fair to give it here : — 

"Ah, sweet Content! where is thy mild abode? 
Is it with Shepherds, and light-hearted Swains, 
Which sing upon the downs, and pipe abroad, 
Tending their flocks and cattle on the plains? 
Ah, sweet Content! where dost thou safely rest? 
In heaven, with angels? which the praises sing 
Of Him that made, and rules at His behest, 
The minds and hearts of every living thing. 
Ah, sweet Content ! where doth thy harbour hold? 
Is it in churches, with Religious Men, 
Which please the gods with prayers manifold; 
And in their studies meditate it then? 
Whether thou dost in heaven, or earth appear; 
Be where thou wilt ! Thou wilt not harbour here ! " 

With all due deference to the opinion of so eminent a critic, and 
that of readers who may agree with him in reckoning this (as he 



i6o Appendix 

does in the Life), an "almost perfect sonnet," reaching "a very 
high level of artistic beauty," I must confess that, though it is free 
from the worst faults of metre and style that characterize most of 
Barnes's poetry, it strikes me as crude and commonplace. The plan 
is good, being like that of Shakespeare's 49th and 64th Sonnets, 
but the execution is clumsy. The rhyme of abroad with abode is 
bad, though the word was evidently chosen for the rhyme rather 
than the sense ; and the same is true of thing below, with its " minds 
and hearts." " On the plains," following " upon the downs " (hills 
or level ground on the top of hills) is sheer metrical "padding" 
without regard to sense. The mixture of theologies in the second 
and third quatrains is in the author's usual style ; but why do the 
polytheistic " religious men " pray to their " gods " in " churches ? " 
And is it content or something else that they "meditate then," and 
would they do it then except for the exigencies of rhyme? And 
wherein does the "artistic beauty " of the muddle consist? 

I will add a few more of Barnes's sonnets, taken quite at random, 
in further illustration of his eccentricities : — 

SONNET 24 

These, mine heart-eating Eyes do never gaze 

Upon thy sun's harmonious marble wheels, 

But from these eyes, through force of thy sun's blaze, 

Rain tears continual whiles my faith's true steels, 

Tempered on anvil of thy heart's cold Flint, 

Strike marrow-melting fire into mine eyes ; 

The Tinder whence my Passions do not stint 

As Matches to those sparkles which arise. 

Which when the Taper of mine heart is lighted, 

Like salamanders, nourish in the flame: 

And all the Loves, with my new Torch delighted, 

Awhile, like gnats, did flourish in the same; 

But burnt their wings, nor any way could frame 

To fly from thence, since Jove's proud bird (that bears 

His thunder) viewed my sun ; but shed down tears. 



Appendix 261 



SONNET 46 

Ah, pierce-eye piercing eye, and blazing light! 

Of thunder, thunder blazes burning up ! 

O sun, sun melting ! blind, and dazing night ! 

Ah, heart ! down-driving heart, and turning up ! 

O matchless beauty, Beauty's beauty staining ! 

Sweet damask rosebud ! Venus' rose of roses ! 

Ah, front imperious, duty's duty gaining ! 

Yet threatful clouds did still inclose and closes. 

O lily leaves, when Juno's lily's leaves 

In wond'ring at her colours' grain distained ! 

Voice which rock's voice and mountain's hilly cleaves 

In sunder, at my loves with pain complained ! 

Eye, lightning sun ! Heart, beauty's bane unfeigned! 

O damask rose ! proud forehead ! lily ! voice ! 

Ah, partial fortune ! sore chance ! silly choice! 

SONNET 49 

Cool ! cool in waves, thy beams intolerable, 

O sun! No son, but most unkind stepfather! 

By law, nor Nature, Sire ; but rebel rather ! 

Fool ! fool ! these labours are inextricable ; 

A burden whose weight is importable ; 

A Siren which, within thy breast doth bathe her ; 

A Fiend which doth in Graces' garments grath her; 

A fortress, whose force is impregnable ; 

From my love's 'lembic, still 'stilled tears. O tears ! 

Quench ! quench mine heat ! or, with your sovereignty, 

Like Niobe, convert mine heart to marble ! 

Or with fast-flowing pine, my body dry, 

And rid me from Despair's chilled fears ! O fears, 

Which on mine heben harp's heartstrings do warble! 

SONNET 50 

So warble out your tragic notes of sorrow, 
Black harp of liver-piercing Melancholy ! 



262 Appendix 



Black Humour, patron of my Fancy's folly! 

Mere follies, which from Fancy's fire, borrow 

Hot fire ; which burns day, night, midnight, and morrow. 

Long morning, which prolongs my sorrows solely, 

And ever overrules my Passions wholly : 

So that my fortune, where it first made sorrow, 

Shall there remain, and ever shall it plow 

The bowels of mine heart ; mine heart's hot bowels ! 

And in their furrows sow the Seeds of Love ; 

Which thou didst sow, and newly spring up now 

And make me write vain words : no words, but vowels ! 

For nought in me, good Consonant would prove. 

In many of Barnes's sonnets words seem to be introduced for the 
rhyme with little or no regard to the meaning. He also takes great 
liberties in rhymes: as changed, range ; throughly, roughly ; woman, 
come on; see them, eye them; hatred, wafred (twice) ; pilot, my 
late ; vassal, pass all ; late, wrote ; pray, apply, etc. New or strange 
words often occur, mostly for rhyme ; as naffe, menceless, searseth, 
wayment, lesses (verb), immurate, etc. In Sonnet 23 we find the 
line, " Her heart whiles Pity's slight had undershoved me " (to 
rhyme with " removed me "). The closing lines of the same sonnet 

are : — ♦ 

" There rest, fair Planets ! Stay, bright orbs of day ! 
Still smiling at my dial, next eleven ! " 

Neither day nor eleven rhymes with any preceding word, and there 
is nothing to explain the use^of eleven, unless it be the reference to 
" Meridian heat," which implies twelve. But such metrical puzzles 
are common in Barnes's verse. In Sonnet 41 is the line, " Then to 
mine eyes each Maid was made a moat" where the peculiar meta- 
phor is imperfectly explained by the preceding lines (the only other 
reference to water in the sonnet) : — 

" Then more then blessed was I, if one tiding 
Of female favour set mine heart afloat ; " 

but a rhyme for afloat was needed. In a description of his lady the 
line occurs, " Her cheeks thin speckled with a summer's male" 



Appendix 263 



where there is nothing to explain male except the necessity of a 
rhyme to pale in " her forehead coloured pale" 

On the whole, the critic who, as Mr. Lee tells us, called Barnes " a 
fool" appears to have been a better judge of his verse than the one 
who thought him " a born singer." That he should have been a 
" rival " to Shakespeare in the favour of Southampton, or the person 
to whom Shakespeare addressed his Sonnets (whoever he may have 
been), is impossible. 

Among half a dozen sonnets, addressed to noble lords and ladies, 
appended to Barnes's Parthenophil and Parthenophe (1593), there 
is one to Southampton ; but we have no evidence that Barnes ever 
dedicated a book to him. The Parthenophil and Parthenophe, 
which was published anonymously, is dedicated on the title-page 
"To the right noble and virtuous gentleman, M. William Percy, 
Esq., his dearest friend." "The Printer," in an introductory 
address "To the Learned Gentlemen Readers," refers to the 
author as " unknown " but " enforced to accord to certain of his 
friends' importunacy " that the poems may be published. The poet 
adds a rhymed preface which begins thus : — 

" Go, bastard Orphan ! Pack thee hence ! 

And seek some Stranger for defence ! 

Now gins thy baseness to be known ! 

Nor dare I take thee for mine own. 



Some good man, that shall think thee witty, 

Will be thy Patron ! and take pity," etc. 
I find no record of any second edition of this book ; but in 1595 
Barnes published a Divine Centurie of Spirituall Sonnets, which 
he dedicated to Toby Matthew, bishop of Durham. He also wrote 
at least one play, The DiviVs Charter, a Tragedie containing the 
Life and Death of Pope Alexander the Sixt, which was performed 
before King James at Christmas 1 606-1 607, and in October, 1607, 
in which year it was also printed. It commended itself to the king 
as an attack on papal pretensions and on magic, but appears to 
have had no merit as a drama. The author died in 1609. 



INDEX OF WORDS AND PHRASES 
EXPLAINED 



acceptable (accent), 145 
accessary, 168 
action (legal), 186 
adder's sense, 217 
admire (= wonder at), 225 
adulterate, 223 
advance (= raise) , 195 
advised respects, 176 
aggravate, 244 
air and fire (elements), 

173 
alchemy (metaphor), 166, 

218 
all-oblivious, 181 
all tyrant (vocative), 246 
allow (= approve), 217 
amiss (noun), 168 
anchored (metaphor), 238 
antique (accent), 155, 183, 

212 
antiquity, 214 
applying fears to hopes, 

222 
approve (=find by experi- 
ence), 244 
April, 144, 207 
aray, 243 
argument (=theme), 170, 

195, 211 
array, 243 

art (= knowledge) , 152 
art (= letters) , 164, 187, 

195 
as (= that), 195 
aspect (accent), 162 
astonished, 200 
attaint (= blame), 196 
attainted, 202 
attend time's leisure, 174 
authorizing (accent), 167 
ay me ! 172 

bankrupt (spelling), 188 

bareness, 145 

base (=bad), 204, 206 

bastard, 188 

bated, 185 



bath (= Bath?), 249 

beard (of grain), 150 

beauty held in lease, 150 

beauty's effect, 146 

becoming of, 231, 246 

bed-vow, 247 

begetter, 142 

bereft (= taken away) , 146 

beshrew, 235 

besides (preposition), 158 

best endowed, 149 

best of dearest, 176 

bestow (=stow), 162 

bevel, 224 

bewailed guilt, 169 

beweep, 164 

bide each check, 182 

black not counted fair, 231 

blenches (noun), 215 

blunt (= clumsy), 211 

books, 159 

bore the canopy, 226 

both twain, 172 

"bower, 231 

brave (=beautiful) , 149 

bravery, 167 

breathers of this world, 

196 
breed (= offspring) , 150 
brows (= eyebrows), 231 
builded, 225 
burns, 242 

came (= became), 235 
candles (= stars), 157 
canker (=worm), 167, 

189, 205 
canker-blooms, 180 
canopy (verb), 150 
captain (adjective), 178 
carcanet, 178 
censures (= judges), 245 
ceremony (metre), 159 
charge (noun), 244 
charged (= attacked) , 190 
cheater, 246 
check (= rebuff), 182 

255 



cheer (=face), 206 

cherubins, 218 

chest (metaphor), 187 

chide with, 216 

chopped, 185 

chronicle, 212 

clean (adverb), 192 

closure of my breast, 176 

comment, 202 

compare (noun), 157, 168 

compile (=compose), 195, 

198 
composed wonder, 183 
compounded with clay, 

190 
conceit (= idea), 152, 162 
condemned for thy hand, 

208 
confined (accent), 213 
confound (=destroy), 145, 

147, 184, 185 
consecrate, 192 
constant heart, 178 
contain (= retain), 194 
content (=happiness), 222 
contents (noun), 181 
contracted, 142 
converted (= changed), 

176 
converted (= turned 

away), 146 
convertest (rhyme), 149, 

i5 2 
copy (= offspring) , 149 
correct correction, 216 
cost (= thing bought), 

186 
count (= account), 143 
counterfeit (= portrait), 

153, 179 
counterfeit (= rhyme), 

179 
couplement, 157 
courses (= years), 183 
coward conquest of 

wretch's knife, 192 
critic (= carper) , 217 



266 



Index of Words and Phrases 



crooked (=malignant) ,184 
cunning (= skill), 160 
curious (=fastidious), 170 

damasked, 233 
darkening, 209 
darkly bright, 173 
date (=time), 170 
dateless (= endless), 165, 

249 
days are nights, 173 
days outworn, 153 
dead seeing, 188 
dear religious love, 165 
dear time's waste, 165 
dearest (= most intense) , 

170 
death's second self, 191 
debate (= contend), 152 
debate (= contest) , 202 
dedicated words, 197 
defeat (= destroy), 184 
defeated (= defrauded), 

157 
delves the parallels, 184 
desert (rhyme), 154, 176, 

J I 9 I . 

determinate, 200 
determination (=end), 150 
devour (= destroy), 155 
disabled (quadrisyllable) , 

187 
discloses (=uncloses), 180 
dispense with, 217 
disperse (= publish), 195 
distillation (= perfume), 

.45. 
divining eyes, 212 
double-vantage, 202 
doubting (= fearing), 192 
dressings, 225 
drooping (= drowsy), 163 
dulling my lines, 211 
dullness (= drowsiness), 

182 
dwellers on form, 226 

eager (= tart), 221 
ear (= plough), 144 
earth and water (ele- 
ments), 173 
edge of doom, 221 
eisel, 216 

elements (four), 173 
enlarged (= set free) , 190 
enlighten, 247 



entitled in thy parts, 170 
envy (accent), 231 
ever-fixed mark, 218 
evermore (adjective), 245 
except (= refuse), 244 
exchange, 215 
expense (= expenditure), 

204, 233 
expense (= loss), 165 
expiate (= bring to an 

end), 158 
extern, 226 
eye of heaven, 154 

fair (= beauty), 154, 188, 

197 
false in rolling (eyes) , 156 
fame (verb), 198 
famished for a look, 175 
false plague, 238 
favour (= countenance) , 

218, 227 
fell arrest, 191 
fester (= rot) , 205 
fickle hour, 229 
filed, 198 

filled up his line, 201 
fitted, 222 
five wits, 240 
flatter, 166 

fleets (= fleetest), 155 
flourish (noun), 184 
foison, 179 
fond (= foolish) , 144 
fond on, 198 
fools of time, 226 
for (= because), 171, 212 
for (= for fear of), 178 
for fear of trust, 159 
fore, 141! 

forlorn (accent), 166 
forsworn, 202 
fortify (intransitive), 143 
frame (= adapt), 221 
free (= liberal), 145 
frequent (= intimate) , 221 
from (= away from) , 243 
fulfil, 237 
fury (= inspiration), 209 

gaudy (= gay) , 143 
gaze (=objectof gaze), 145 
general of hot desire, 249 
gentle, 205 
give it light, 170 
give salutation, 223 



go (= walk), 177 

gored mine own thoughts, 

215 
gracious (= full of grace), 

184 
gracious (trisyllable), 236 
greeing, 219 
grind (= whet), 216 
groan, 234 
grow (=be), 197 
gust (= taste), 219 

habit (= bearing), 239 
hands of falsehood, 175 
happies, 146 
heaven's gate, 164 
heavy ignorance, 195 
heavy Saturn, 207 
heavy tears, 174 
height (of star), 220 
Helen's cheek, 179 
hell of time, 222 
his (= its) , 148, 152, 192, 

198 
hope of orphans, 206 
horse (plural), 203 
hours (dissyllable), 145 
house (= family), 151 
hue (= shape), 151 
hues (= Hughes?), 156 
hugely politic, 226 
hungry ocean, 186 
husbandry, 151 

I hate from hate away she 
threw, 243 

idle rank, 224 

ill-wresting, 240 

imaginary (= imagina- 
tive), 163 

imprisoned absence of 
your liberty, 182 

in their wills, 223 

incertainties, 213 

indigest, 218 

influence, 195 

inhearse, 200 

instinct (accent), 177 

insults o'er, 214 

intend, 163 

interest (= right), 165 

invention (= imagina- 
tion), 170, 193 

jacks, 175 

just to the time, 215 



Index of Words and Phrases 



2 6 7 



keeps (= guards) , 235 
key (pronunciation), 178 
kindness (=affection),247 
king (= possessor), 185 

lace (= embellish) , 188 
lame (figurative?), 169,202 
latch (= catch), 218 
lay (= lay on) , 210 
learned's wing, 195 
leaves out difference, 211 
leese, 146 

level (= aim), 221, 223 
liberty (= license), 172 
like as, 183, 221 
like of hearsay, 157 
limbecks, 222 
lines of life, 153 
live (= subsist), 145 
live twice, 154 
lively (= living), 249 
lovely argument, 195 
lover (masculine), 166 
love's fresh case, 214 
lower (= frown) , 246 

maiden gardens, 153 
main of light, 183 
make faults, 169 
makeless, 147 
makest waste in niggard- 

ing, 143 
many's looks, 203 
map of days outworn, 188 
marigold, 161 
marjoram, 208 
married (metaphor), 147 
Mars his sword, 181 
master (= possess), 212 
master-mistress, 156 
meetness, 221 
melancholy (metre), 174 
merchandized, 210 
minion (= darling), 230 
misprision, 201 
mixed with seconds, 227 
moan the expense, 165 
mock their own presage, 

213 
modern (= ordinary) , 197 
moiety, 174 
more and less, 205 
mortal (= deadly) , 186 
mother's glass, thy, 144 
motley (= jester), 215 
mourning (play upon) ,234 



mouthed graves, 194 
music (personal), 147, 

231 
music to hear, 147 
mutual render, 229 
my next self, 235 

nativity (= child), 183 
Nature's bequest, 144 
new-fangled, 203 
new pride, 193 
niggard truth, 191 
no such matter, 201 
noted weed, 193 

obsequious (= devoted) , 

227 
obsequious (= funereal) , 

165 
o'er-green (verb), 216 
o'erlook (= peruse), 196 
on another's neck, 234 
one reckoned none, 237 
out-going, 147 
owe (= possess), 190 

pace forth, 181 
pain (= punishment) , 240 
painful (= toilsome), 161 
part his function, 218 
partake (= take part), 245 
parts of me, 165 
pass (= result), 211 
past cure, past care, 245 
patent, 201 
peace of you, 192 
perfect'st, 177 
perfumed tincture, 180 
perspective, 159 
phoenix, 155 
pitiful thrivers, 227 
pointing (= appointing), 

I 5 I 
policy, that heretic, 226 
posting, 177 
poverty (concrete), 171, 

211 
prayers divine, 214 
predict (noun), 152 
present (= instant), 246 
pressed by these rebel 

powers, etc., 243 
pretty, 172 
prevent (= anticipate), 

209 
pricked (= marked), 157 



pride, 246 

prime (= spring), 206 

private, 148 

prizing (= regarding) , 241 

profitless usurer, 145 

prophetic soul, 213 

proud full sail, 199 

proud-pied April, 207 

prove (=find), 190, 249 

pupil pen, 154 

purge, 221 

purple (=red), 208 

pursuit (accent), 241 

qualify (= temper), 214 
quest (= inquest), 174 
question make, 150 
quick, 218 
quietus, 230 

rack (= clouds), 167 

rage (= destructive pow- 
er), 186 

rage (poet's), 154 

ragged (= rugged), 148 

ranged, 215 

rank (= foul), 224 

rank (= sick), 221 

read such art, 152 

rearward, 203 

receipt, 237 

record (accent), 183, 225 

recured, 174 

reek, 233 

reeleth (of the sun), 146 

region (= air), 167 

remembered (= remind- 
ed), 223 

render (noun), 229 

render (= surrender) , 230 

renewed, 216 

reserve (= preserve) , 166 

reserve their character, 
198 

respect (= affection) , 168 

respect (= consideration) , 
162 

resty, 209 

retention, 224 

revolt (= faithlessness) , 
203 

riches (singular), 201 

rondure. 157 

roses of shadow, 188 

rotten smoke, 167 

ruinate, 148 



268 



Index of Words and Phrases 



ruined choirs, 191 
ruth (= pity), 234 

salve (= apology), 223 
satire (=' satirist), 209 
scarlet ornaments, 240 
sealed false bonds of love, 

241 
seat, 172 

seconds (= flour) , 227 
self-substantial fuel, 142 
sense (plural), 160, 203 
sense (= reason), 168 
sensual feast, 240 
separable spite, 168 
sessions of thought, 165 
set a form upon, 202 
set me light, 201 
several plot, 238 
shadow(=image), 163, 170 
shady stealth, 194 
she (.= woman), 234 
simplicity (= folly), 187 
Siren tears, 222 
slandering creation, 231 
so_(=thus), 198 
soil (= solution) , 189 
soundless, 196 
spacious (trisyllable), 236 
special (adverb), 178 
spirit (monosyllable), 196 
sport (= sensuality), 205 
sportive (= amorous), 223 
stage (allusion to), 152 
stain (intransitive), 167 
stand (play upon), 247 
stand against thy sight, 

170 
star (astrological), 162 
state (noun), 206, 225 
statute, 235 

steal from his figure, 211 
steep-up, 146 
steepy night, 185 
stelled, 159 
stewards, 204 
stick (= hesitate), 148 
store (noun), 149, 152, 

188, 198 
strained (=overwrought) , 

197 
strange (= stranger), 179 
strangely, 215 
strangle (acquaintance), 

202 
stretched metre, 154 



suborned informer, 229 
subscribe (= yield), 214 
successive, 231 
sufferance (= suffering) , 

182 
suggest (= tempt) , 242 
suited (= clad), 231 
suit thy pity like, 234 
sum my count, 143 
summer (of life), 186 
summer's front, 210 
summer's story, 207 
supposed as forfeit, 213 
surly, sullen bell, 190 
suspect (noun), 189 
swart-complexioned, 163 
sweet-seasoned, 192 
sweet thief, 168 
swift extremity, 177 
sympathized, 197 

table (= tablet) , 159 
tables (= note-book), 224 
tallies (noun), 224 
tame to sufferance, 182 
tasters, 168 
teeming autumn, 206 
tell (= count) , 165 
terms (legal), 244 
that (= so that), 193, 207 
thorns, standing on, 209 
thou (in the Sonnets), 150 
thought (= melancholy), 

171, 173 
thrall (= bondman), 249 
thriftless (—unprofitable), 

. T 43 

tie up envy, 190 
time (= th^ world) , 221 
time removed, 206 
Time's chest, 187 
Time's fool, 220 
time's pencil, 153 
times (=generations), 149 
times in hope, 184 
tires (=head-dresses), 179 
to time thou growest, 155 
tongue-tied, 239 
took (= taken), 175, 193 
top of happy hours, 153 
tottered (= tattered), 143, 

162 
tract (= track) , 147 
translate (= transform), 

206 
travail (spelling), 195 



triumphant prize, 246 
truth (= duty), 172 
twire, 163 
tyrants, 145 

uneared, 144 
unfair (verb), 145 
unkind (noun?), 177 
unknown minds, 221 
unlettered, 198 
unlooked for, 160 
unperfect, 158 
unrespected, 173, 180 
unthrift, 148, 151 
untrimmed, 155 
untrue (adverb), 191 
use (= interest) , 146, 235 
user (= possessor) , 131 

vade, 180 

vaunt (= exult), 152 

viki, 190 

violet past prime, 149 

virginal, 232 

virtuous lie, 190 

warrantise of skill, 248 
wastes of Time, 150 
weed (= dress), 143 
well-contented, 166 
whenas, 176 

where (= to where), 173 
where through, 160 
whether (monosyllable), 

l8 u 3 

wight, 212 

Will (play upon), 182, 
235, 241 

windows of age. 144 

wink (= shut the eyes) , 
173, 182 

with Nature's hand 
painted, 155 

without all, 188, 192 

wives (= hairs), 233 

wooed of time, 189 

work my mind, 163 

world's due, 143 

world-without-end, 182 

worth (= stellar influ- 
ence), 219 

wound with thine eye, 239 

wrack (rhyme), 230 

wracked, 196 

wrackful, 186 

write for me, 235 



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